
Class 3_EjJ3_CLL- 
Book.C6<? 

Copyright N? 



COKRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM 
THE WIDER WORLD 



EDITED BY 

WILLIAM C^OMSTOCK 




BOSTON 

RICHARD G. BADGER 

THE GOEHAM PRESS 



dl 



Copyright, 1920, by William C. Comstock 



All Rights Reserved 



l3F |30t 



JAN I G 1921 

Made in the United States of America 



The Gorham Press, Boston, U. S. A. 

§)CI.A605330 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER 

WORLD 5 

PRACTICAL APPLICATION OF FREED LIVES' 

PHILOSOPHY IN THEIR OWN WORDS . . 37 

A Brief Resume of the Main Thought • . . 43 

The Quoted Passages and My Comment ... 44 

PURPOSE 143 



g Worb for Help from ttje Wtber 
all 01 lb 



aiorb for l^tlp from tfje Mititv OTortti 

^IT'HERE is a widespread interest to-day in 
^•^ Spiritism, and perhaps it is natural that the 
interest in proving the fact of communication 
between this world and the world beyond earth is 
greater than that in the quality of the communica- 
tion. Yet our reason would tell us that the mere 
fact of such communication would be to us of 
little real value unless the word which comes from 
the wider world be a word of help to us in living 
the man's life well ; unless it help us to understand 
better the meaning of man's life; and help us to 
faith in God, and faith in the wisdom of His 
purpose. 

In these later days of the world men's opinions 
as to what is true in philosophy are all at sea, for 
there are nearly as many schools of philosophy as 
there are writers on the subject, and all men's 
philosophies are theories which leave us doubting 
and unsatisfied. 

But a philosophy has been given to the world in 
plain, untechnical words which adapts itself to 
all conditions of man's life, and to all ages of man- 

7 



8 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

kind's progress; which adapts itself to the facts of 
man's work, and man's selfhood ; a philosophy which 
is understandable, consistent, and satisfying. 

And this philosophy comes to us from personali- 
ties in the wider world who were, when they were 
men, prominent as thinkers, and who, with the 
wider vision of those who are freed from man's 
limitations, see more clearly the true relation of 
man's life to the whole life of self, and would, by 
their words, help men to a right understanding of 
themselves, their personal work, and their personal 
problems and responsibilities. 

These personalities assert in so many words that 
they know they tell truth. And so their word is of 
incalculable value to men; of value far beyond the 
mere fact of communication from the other world. 
It is a word of value to men's thinking, to their 
work, to the formation of ideals, aspirations, and 
personal character. It is practical help, for it recog- 
nizes the facts of man's life in the earth environ- 
ment, and shows how to utilize the opportunities 
of the life which one must live while he is a man, 
to the end that one shall learn, by the teaching of 
earth, that which will be a help through all of life's 
future. 

It is this writer's high privilege to be the amanu- 
ensis for these personalities in the other world, and, 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 9 

as amanuensis, to have transcribed their philosophy 
as it was dictated to him word by word. It was not 
given to him as thought to be written out in his 
own words, but dictated to his mental hearing word 
by word, to be written just as it was received, as 
any dictation by man to man would be. It was not 
received through the ouija-board, nor through auto- 
matic writing, nor in a trance, but by a normally 
conscious scribe in wakeful possession of all his facul- 
ties, as part of his daily work. It was published 
by direction of its authors first in four volumes, as 
they were finished in four successive years, and later 
consolidated into one volume under the title 
"Thought for Help." And thousands of copies 
have been distributed on two continents. 

As its title suggests, it is not, in strict definition 
of the term, a philosophy. But it is a plain state- 
ment of premises, which those who state them 
declare they know are true premises, from which a 
thinker can formulate a sound and satisfying philos- 
ophy. 

It is the problem of Philosophy to furnish to 
men an explanation of the meaning of life and of 
reality which will appeal to their reason as the true 
explanation. This problem has engaged men's 
minds since the days of Plato and Aristotle. The 
solutions are almost as many as the philosophical 



io A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

thinkers, each one convincing only to its advocates. 
Men need help in their thinking, and who so able 
to help as those who live the life that is wider than 
man's life on earth, who, freed from the man's 
limitations of thought, look upon the problems that 
engage men's thinking with wider understanding. 

And what more natural than that thinkers who 
had helped men while they themselves were men 
should still wish to help men through the thought 
which, from their wider knowledge of the conditions 
of life, they know to be right ? 

I, whom they made their scribe, who have worked 
for them and with them to present their thoughts 
to men, am not a philosopher. I am just a "man in 
the street," a business man, still occupied during the 
day with the business man's usual work. I did not 
even read philosophy after my college days away 
back in the sixties, till the interest caused by what I 
was writing as a scribe made me wish to see what 
metaphysicians were offering as their solution of the 
problems of life and reality. I did not choose the 
work which I have done; it was offered for my 
acceptance as a work which would be of help to 
men, and, naturally, I accepted it. I had not the 
slightest idea of what form it would take, what 
thought would be given me to transcribe, nor that 
books for publication were to be written. And 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD ix 

through all the work I have been merely a scribe 
who wrote from telepathic dictation thought which 
was not his own, in words which were not his own. 
In all the preparing, naming, dividing into parts 
and chapters, revising and amending, and publishing 
books, I have obeyed the instructions given me, as 
any competent scribe would do. 

I say this to make it clearly understood that it is 
not, and could not be my word which I have writ- 
ten, and which I praise, but a real word from the 
wider life, intended by those who told it to be of 
broad and helpful significance to men. 

As the writing progressed, the doctrine unfolded 
into a broad, sane, healthful and consistent philos- 
ophy of life, to me far more satisfying than any 
of the men's philosophies which I read carefully and 
thoughtfully. 

It is not a technical treatise, abounding in terms 
whose meaning the plain man has to search for, 
but is told in plain, terse English. It conforms to 
no metaphysical "ism," but is broad as humanity 
itself. 

It is founded on the eternal truth that God is, 
and is Creator and Ruler of all that is beside Him- 
self. And the kernel of the doctrine is — the Eternal 
Supremacy of the Will of God, whose purpose for 
the lives whom He created must be fulfilled, since 



12 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

it is the Omnipotent Purpose; and the dignity and 
value of the lives whom He created immortal per- 
sonal selves, who are destined, and made able, to 
fulfill His omnipotent purpose for them by their 
own wise use of the free powers with which He 
endows them. 

There is no hesitation or doubt in the affirma- 
tion that God is Creator of His universe; and the 
inevitable corollary is that God and His universe 
are not one. The "coherent whole" for which 
men's minds seek, is the "whole" of God and the 
universe which He created by His will. That 
which is made is not a part of its Maker. While it 
remains a thought it is part of its thinker; when 
it is manifested it is no longer a part of him. The 
universe is God's thought manifested. And the 
affirmation that God is creator of His universe 
means, irresistibly, that the universe is not a part of 
its creator; that man is not a part of God; that 
God and His universe are two, not one. And the 
affirmation that Infinite God is immanent through- 
out His universe, and that His Supreme Will rules 
it in every part, and that finally and surely all that 
He made fulfills His Omnipotent Purpose, gives 
to us men the "coherent and consistent whole" 
which our minds seek. 

Equally without doubt or hesitation is the affir- 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 13 

mation that Christ was God come to earth to show 
to man the perfect life of man. Thus dictates Dr. 
Coulter — "We who write this book were with 
Christ, some of us, and tell that which we know. 
He was man, He is God, we know that well; we 
know it with the freed life's knowledge. Man, yet 
God, while on earth Christ was. The words tell 
truth ; we know our Christ. 

"Men have faith that, though Christ was man, 
He was God also. We know Christ the Spirit, 
the life of God made Son by the Father of All. We 
who were men were faithful to Christ's person as 
man, some of us. Freed from earth, men no longer 
but lives freed, we know Himself. " 

And thus dictates Miltiades — "We who know, 
who wish to add our testimony to that of Dr. Coul- 
ter, we who lived when Christ was on earth, tell 
this through Will, the mouthpiece on earth now — 

"Christ was God, we know it. We were wit- 
nesses to His life, His miracles, witnesses to His 
resurrection, some of us . . . Man He was, 
clothed with man's body, with man's infirmities, 
but God in His will, His strength, His perfection. 
God was Christ for the help of man, His creature. 

"I who tell this, a sinner many years on earth, 
Miltiades as a Greek, Matthew the Publican as a 
Jew when Christ was on earth, know. I am the 



14 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

mouthpiece for many who through me bear wit- 
ness." 

It is nineteen hundreds years since Christ lived 
on earth, yet here we have the testimony of those 
who knew Him on earth, and who know Him now 
in the life freed from earth, that of their personal 
knowledge Christ was, and is, God. And I, the 
scribe who wrote on paper the testimony which I 
have quoted, affirm that I wrote it just as it was 
dictated to me ; I affirm that I did "not write it 
because I had thought it beforehand and wished to 
set down my thought in my own words; I affirm 
that neither the thought nor the words were my 
own ; I affirm that I was not in a trance, nor in a 
state of mental exhaltation, but was sitting quietly 
at my accustomed desk, in my accustomed room, as 
normally conscious of myself and my surroundings 
as you are at this moment ; I affirm that there was 
no human being within speaking distance whose 
words I could hear with the bodily ear, and that I 
wrote from telepathic dictation, knowing perfectly 
what I had written, but not knowing what would 
come; of my own will prohibiting my mind from 
thinking ahead ; and listening mentally only for the 
word to follow the one which I was writing. Under 
such conditions it is evident that the thought and 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 15 

word could not be my own or those of any other 
human being. 

But, one might say, it is too far-fetched, it is con- 
trary to reason to suppose that those who lived 
nineteen hundred years ago could to-day testify as 
to Christ. But why is it contrary to reason? 

The personalities who thus testify affirm also that 
the life of man, his ego, is immortal ; and when it is 
freed from earth it continues its personal life in 
the wider world, the universe its home; also that 
the life, or self, is reincarnated many times in man's 
flesh since one short lifetime of man is not enough 
for the teaching which the self needs before it enters 
into the wider life ; also that, though the man merci- 
fully does not remember his former lives, the con- 
tinuing self when freed from earth does remember 
his former lives as man, remembers his successes 
and his mistakes, and finds wisdom from the remem- 
brance. So their whole story hangs together. They 
do not forget earth, they have not lost interest in 
earth, and, from the surer knowledge of freed life 
they wish to help men to the firm faith that must 
be the foundation of their right thinking and right 
living. Is there anything contrary to reason in 
that? 

But, one may say, it is impossible. How does he 



1 6 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

know it is impossible? A man's knowledge is of 
the world he lives on. How does he know what is 
impossible for God, the Omnipotent? 

But the reincarnation of souls theory was ex- 
ploded long ago, some one may say. Yet for the 
freed souls who now live the wider life it is not 
theory, but remembered experience. Is it because 
men do not remember their former lives that they 
conclude that reincarnation is but an exploded 
theory? Would it be well for them if they did 
remember? Judging by the lives of men of to-day, 
would all the selves who are men to-day, or even 
a large portion of them, in a future reincarnation 
remember with happy memory their lives of to-day ? 
Would it be a kindness of their Creator to let them 
remember the evil done in former life before they 
have gained strength to resist temptation, and 
learned wisdom that enables them to profit by the 
remembrance? Is it not merciful that men do not 
have the pain and sorrow that memories would often 
bring them? 

The self is a developing life, destined by his 
Maker to immortal growth. He is a personal life, 
both on earth and while life is. He is a finite life 
purposed by his Maker the highest growth that 
finiteness may attain. The powers with which he is 
endowed are personal powers, and they are free 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 17 

powers. The personal self uses them well or ill, 
as he chooses. His wisdom is finite wisdom and he 
is liable to choose ill. Then he needs teaching. The 
life on earth is the primary school of immortal 
personal self. One man's life on earth is but a 
breath in immortal life, and not long enough for the 
teaching that the self requires before he is ready to 
enter upon his wider life of wider work, wider vi- 
sion, and wider worth than man may know; to 
enter, that is, upon the next stage in his immortal 
growth. 

We, with our finite vision, can see the wisdom of 
the Wilier of Life in making it a personal, indi- 
vidual self. Life would not be worth living if we 
were all alike. We can see His wisdom in gifting 
each life with personal powers — reasoning mind, 
memory, will and purpose — that are individual pow- 
ers, thus fitting each life for struggle, and for per- 
sonal achievement. We can see His wisdom in 
creating lives not to be forced and therefore irre- 
sponsible marionettes, but to be sentient, reason- 
ing, personal selves, able to learn wisdom in their 
own use of personal will and purpose through the 
teaching of experience, able to choose the right, wise 
use of personal will and purpose because made able 
to reason from experience. 

And if the self does not choose wisely in one short 



1 8 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

lifetime in man, what more reasonable belief than 
that the Wilier of Life, who does not force, but 
teaches His creatures, gives the unwise self another 
opportunity to learn, in another lifetime in man's 
body on earth ? It is on earth that the self prepares 
for the wider life; it is by man's life well lived 
that immortal self becomes worthy the higher life 
of self beyond man and earth, the higher life that 
is freed forever from man and earth. 

If we have faith that God created life, if we 
have faith in immortality, we cannot think that 
He purposes for one life eternal happiness and for 
another eternal punishment; we must believe that 
He purposes for every life happiness finally. We 
know that we are personal selves; we know that 
we do will and purpose as we ourselves choose. 
By the gift of free will and free purpose God 
places upon ourselves the responsibility, and by the 
gift of reasoning mind He makes us able, to find 
the wisdom to fulfill His purpose for us of our own 
free choice. He is not a cruel, He is a loving 
Father; and His love gives to everyone the opportu- 
nities that he needs to learn, through the earth 
teaching, the wisdom in the use of his free personal 
powers that fits him to enter upon his further work 
in the wider life beyond earth. Reincarnation, then, 
though often a penalty, is always an opportunity. 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 19 

The personal self chooses to use well or to misuse 
this opportunity. He chooses then to forward or 
retard his life on its way to freedom. He chooses 
whether his teaching shall be hard or kindly. Weak- 
ness begets weakness, and strength begets strength. 
Weakness to-day means hard penalty in the next 
reincarnation; strength to-day means progress. But 
the life is made able to learn, is purposed worth 
for the wider life finally, and the Omnipotent 
Purpose will finally be fulfilled. So, though we 
may grieve for the life that misuses his opportunity, 
who chooses this time evil and wickedness, we 
cannot despair. God teaches every life with the 
teaching that he needs, and God teaches surely. 
Every self chooses finally to fulfill God's will, and 
to work for, and thus win his wider, fuller, per- 
sonal life beyond earth. 

What men call "the problem of evil" becomes, 
then, "the problem of free will." Natural evil, 
such as pain, sickness, famine, accident, catastrophe, 
involves no moral question; but the evil that men 
conceive and do, the evil that men suffer through 
the acts of other men, is the consequence of free will 
misused. Through the centuries of man's life on 
earth their understanding of what is evil, and what 
is good, what is right and what is wrong, has 
greatly changed, but there has always been an under- 



20 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

standing that this act was good and that other was 
evil, this act wrong and that one right, and the evil 
act or the good act is the choice of man's free will. 
I do not quite like the phrase "evil is good in the 
making" ; yet it cannot be denied that the conse- 
quences of evil acts teach mankind. But evil is 
undeniably evil, and only when it teaches can it be 
called good in the making. 

The life of personal self is made for the struggle 
which brings in the end for all lives, though not 
for all men, high personal character. It is high 
personal character which makes the self ready for 
its wider life, freed from returning to earth. Per- 
sonal character is achieved through personal strug- 
gle. High personal character is positive. In a 
world where all is good, and no need could arise 
for the struggle with evil, personal character would 
be negative. Decision would not be needed ; strength 
would not be needed. There would be no neces- 
sity and no responsibility for choice, no lesson to be 
learned, no interest in to-day or to-morrow, no use 
for will or purpose, in the deadly monotony of a 
life without struggle. 

The wise Wilier of Life makes the life a personal 
self, gives to it mind which inevitably finds the 
moral idea, makes the life free in its use of its own 
will and purpose, places the life in an environment 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 21 

suited to the development of its free powers, makes 
it able to learn and purposes that it shall learn to 
overcome evil and choose the good; when it fails 
to learn this time on earth, gives it another man's 
lifetime on earth, and thus another opportunity; 
and, when it has learned to choose wisely, and to 
be firm in its wise will and purpose, translates the 
self to a wider, fuller, worthier, happier personal 
life beyond earth. 

Wise and loving Father of all His children, He 
does not purpose for one life the joy of personal 
achievement and eternal happiness, and for another 
the misery of failure and eternal unhappiness. He 
purposes for everyone happiness finally. And, 
though the wisdom of the finite life is but finite and 
therefore liable to err, still the life is made able to 
learn to correct its errors, and, of its free choice 
and its free purpose, to attain the worth which He 
purposes it shall attain before He frees it from 
earth forever. 

It is not necessary to go into the question whether 
good and evil are truths not dependent upon man's 
reason. Men recognize them both as facts in the 
struggle of life. The "problem of evil" is really 
the "problem of free will," and reincarnation is 
life's renewed opportunity to learn to fulfill of free 
will the wise and loving purpose of our Father. 



22 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

In this doctrine which is by lives in the wider 
world declared to be true, God is not a vague 
"Absolute" or "Whole," of whom, in some way not 
clearly defined, the universe, its worlds, Earth, men, 
animals, reptiles, insects, are parts. He is the Living 
God, the Fullness of Personality, Creator of all 
that is besides Himself, whose omniscient wisdom 
knows all, and whose omnipotent will rules all that 
He created; whose will made man the crown of 
His creation, a conscious, reasoning, willing, pur- 
posing, free, immortal but finite personal self, whose 
loving purpose teaches every child of His the wisdom 
that his finite life needs. 

Were man a part of Infinite God, how could he 
be finite? Were man a part of Omnipotent God, 
how could he need finite will and purpose? Were 
man a part of Omniscient God, how could he need 
finite wisdom? Were man a part of God how 
could he ever be weak or wicked, as we know he is 
many times? Were man part of God, where is 
man's responsibility? 

Of course men's thought seeks a coherent and con- 
sistent "absolute" or "whole." That is but natural. 
Infinite God and the finite universe that He created 
and rules, form a coherent and consistent whole for 
thought. Infinite God, part of whom is finite, is 
not coherent or consistent thought. 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 23 

From Plato to Bergson the "riddle of the uni- 
verse" has engaged men's deepest thinking, and the 
solutions offered by philosophical theories are many, 
and, as is to be expected, conflicting. But philosophy 
deals with the deepest concerns of man's life and 
nature. And its purpose is to find, and put before 
men in a logical argument, truth. So, though the 
divergencies of philosophical theories will never be 
brought into concord while men think, since their 
vision of truth varies so widely, philosophical 
thought is one of mankind's greatest helps. The 
"man in the street" who wishes to be in touch with 
broader and higher thought than his economic strug- 
gle brings, reads philosophy with care and study, 
seeking and finding therein help and inspiration. 

But the "man in the street," who deals every day 
with stubborn facts, is apt to protest against some 
very prominent theories, finding in them no aid to 
his thinking. 

He finds no comfort in the thought that this 
world is only an "appearance," or in the thought 
of pure idealism, which makes "mind" the source 
and creator of all reality, both ideal and natural. 
He cannot believe that God intends his life to be 
a lie. 

He finds no comfort in the thought that his 
destiny is either to be absorbed into an all-pervasive 



24 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

"spiritual whole," and thus lose his selfhood with 
all that selfhood means to him; or else, when his 
body dies, to go out into nothingness. If either be 
his destiny, he finds no meaning in his life of strug- 
gle and responsibility, no need for his conscious- 
ness of an "ought," no benefit in any effort except 
to get all the enjoyment that he can out of his 
earth life without interesting himself in what is to 
come when his earth life finishes. As well be nothing 
as to lose his selfhood. 

He finds no comfort in the thought that his sen- 
timent, willing, purposing personality is the result 
of a mere self-existent "process," or "force," or 
"push," impersonal, and therefore without intention 
or purpose in its working, which somehow creates 
him. If that be true, what meaning is there in 
worship or thanks or prayer? 

And the conflict between theories, each of which 
is, of course, urged with all the force of argument 
at the command of its author as the true theory, 
brings to the mind of the "man in the street" a 
feeling of doubt as to the validity of philosophical 
conclusions which leaves him unconvinced and unsa- 
tisfied. 

But the doctrine which is given to us by personali- 
ties in the wider life, which is not theory but truth 
known to them, is satisfying. There is in it no 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 25 

element of doubt. It is affirmed as truth by those 
who have passed through the whole experience of 
man's life on earth, have learned the wisdom which 
men may learn, have earned their freedom from 
man's limitations, and now, in the life of wider 
vision, fuller knowledge, and higher being than men 
may have, know the truth of life and reality, which 
men seek to find by speculative theories. 

With them there is no doubt of the truth of 
God, Creator and Ruler of all that is besides Him- 
self ; there is no doubt of the truth of the Divinity 
of Christ, for they knew Him as man, some of 
them, and they know Him now, with the wider 
life's knowledge, as the Saviour of mankind on all 
worlds where men live, and as their God whom 
they reverently worship. There is no doubt of the 
truth of immortality, and of personal immortality 
of the life made finite. There is no doubt of the 
wisdom of God's will, which made life not His 
puppet, but His child endowed with free personal 
powers. There is no doubt of the love of God's 
purpose, which governs life, not as a puppet is gov- 
erned, but as a child is governed by a wise father, 
through the awakening of his understanding of the 
meaning of his life, his work, his duty, and his free 
will; the love which teaches every child till he 
gladly fulfills the will of his Father; which destines 



26 4 WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

not one child to ultimate failure, but each and all 
to the joy of personal achievement, by his own 
free powers, through the ages of immortality. 

And all achievement by the personal self who 
is made by his Creator free in will and purpose is 
won by his own work for it. "Work is the normal 
for life, both on earth and when freed," says Dr. 
Coulter. The work of man on earth is part of 
his immortal life's work. It is done with the pow- 
ers which belong to man's immortal self. Says Dr. 
Coulter, "Your powers that you use are your life's 
powers. You think while working, you use your 
life's mind. You will while working, you use your 
life's will. You purpose your worth, you use your 
life's purpose. While you work, while you will, it 
is life in you that works and wills. You use life's 
powers, for you are life." And again, "Would 
men think that life leaves earth without those pow- 
ers which help man?" 

And those powers are made ready by man's work 
with them for the life's use in the wider work 
beyond earth. Those powers are adequate for the 
life's use always. They grow broader with the life's 
growth. They suffice always for the life's work of 
personal achievement. The life uses them in its 
earth work; finally, as a man, learns to use them 
wisely and to keep them firm in work ; carries them 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 27 

to the wider world of freedom from earth, and in 
that wider field uses them in its work for the unend- 
ing growth that life's Maker purposes for immortal 
personal self. 

Work, in the word from the freed life, is not 
merely physical exertion. It is personal effort. Fine 
thought is work, for it is found by effort of mind. 
Firm will is work, for it is gained by personal effort. 
Firm purpose is work, for it is maintained by steady 
effort. Worth of life is work, for it is the achieve- 
ment of personal effort. 

The work of earth, then, is physical, mental, and 
moral effort. In it the life uses all its immortal 
powers. The life works well or ill as it chooses, 
for it is made a free personal self. The life is made 
able to learn through its work; the life is taught 
by its work of earth. "No work has man but will 
teach if men will learn. ,, 1 The man is life this time 
on earth. The man does not always choose to learn. 
Reincarnation is life's renewed opportunity to learn 
wisdom and firmness in use of all its powers, "God's 
gracious permission that self may redeem its errors 
and work its freedom finally. ,, 2 

The life is made for worth, and by God's purpose 
its worth is won by its free use of its own immor- 

*Dr. Coulter. 
"Miltiades. 



28 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

tal powers. By life's own work, and of life's free 
choice, every life finally fulfills God's wise and lov- 
ing purpose for it, every life finds the joy of personal 
worth won by itself, every life wins on earth the 
worth for freedom from earth, every life thanks its 
Maker for its selfhood and its work, every life, 
when it has earned its freedom, rises from worth 
to worth by its own work, its own firm personal 
effort, through the ages of immortality. "God made 
man the highest being endowed with life." 3 

In a few words these are the premises given to us 
by personalities in the wider life, upon which to 
found a true philosophy. 

God, Creator and Ruler of all that is beside 
Himself. 

The Universe, developed from matter and force 
as its Creator ordained ; an orderly universe because 
governed by the laws which He ordained. 

Life, a mystery which none but its Creator can 
fully understand. 

Man's life, developed from man's germ which 
was with original matter when matter was created, 
developed upon worlds when worlds were ready 
for it, never on worlds the life of any creature but 
man, different from any other life, developed by 
God's way to personality of self, purposed personal 

*Dr. Coulter. 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 29 

immortality when created, given purposed immor- 
tality with immortal personal powers when devel- 
oped to fitness for that gift, the highest created 
being. 

The purpose of the Supreme Will who created 
the free personal self for that self, which must be 
fulfilled by that free self's own will and purpose. 
And for that end He teaches the self, to whom He 
gives also reasoning mind, in as many reincarnations 
as man on earth, which are the self's renewed oppor- 
tunities to learn, as the self needs, until the finite 
self fulfills His Infinite Will of its own free choice. 

He teaches each life, and He teaches surely. 

But every life must earn its purposed freedom 
from earth by its own work on earth. Free as air 
is the life while it learns, yet bound by Omnipotent 
Purpose because made to learn, made for worth, 
made for the personal struggle through which it 
learns to earn the worth purposed for it by its 
Maker. 

Here is a doctrine which teaches wisdom, and 
courage, and faith; a doctrine coherent, consistent, 
inspiring; sensible, for it teaches men the meaning 
and importance of the man's life on earth in its 
true relation to the whole life of personal self; 
reverent in its firm faith in the Wilier of All; 
broad, for it may be believed fully by every Chris- 



30 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

tian who worships God, whatever be the form of 
worship which he finds most helpful; true, for it 
is given for men's help by "those who know." 

And the very fact that it was given to this scribe 
without any plan of his own as to what he was to 
write; without any fore-knowledge of his as to its 
thought; without his choosing a single word of its 
diction; in the quiet of his room with door closed, 
and no human being within hearing distance; and 
that it was arranged in parts, chapters and books, 
by the same method By which its text was written ; 
the fact that such work was far from his thought 
until it was proposed to him by Dr. Coulter; the 
fact that Dr. Coulter and others whose thought 
is in the books with never-failing patience taught 
their scribe to do his part rightly through many 
months of doubt and mistakes, until he learned to 
stifle his own thoughts while writing for them, 
to form no conclusions as to what was to come from 
what had already been written, to choose no word 
himself, but write the very word given to him, 
and, while writing that, to listen mentally only for 
the word next to be written; the fact that in this 
way a coherent and consistent philosophy of life was 
written; the fact of the unfailing reverence of its 
thought, and its value to men's work and thought, 
and life; all these are, to this scribe, incontestible 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 31 

proofs that the word is what it claims to be, a word 
for men from personalities in the wider life beyond 
earth. 

Subconscious mind would not explain it. It is 
impossible that it was telepathy from any human 
being, for, after he had learned to work rightly, 
the dictation was equally clear in his accustomed 
room or in any other room thousands of miles away. 
And this writer's faith in the truth that he is co- 
worker with real personalities in the life beyond 
earth in a work purposed by them to be a help to 
men's thinking, cannot be shaken. 

Wonderful help is the word to one's thinking. 
One is assured that faith in God, Creator and 
Ruler of All, is the right faith. He is assured that 
faith in a personal God is right, and that the so- 
called anthropomorphism in men's thought of God 
is not wholly wrong. But God is not like man; 
man is to a degree like God. Himself the "Fullness 
of Personality, ,, 4 omnipotent in will and purpose, 
omniscient, infinite in being, God made man like 
Himself in that He gave to man's life powers which, 
though finite, are like in kind to His own infinite 
powers. And man finds a personal God because 
man is made, though but partly and finitely, like his 
Creator. He whom man finds his personal God is 

4 Dr. Coulter. 



32 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

no mere concept of a vague "absolute" or "whole," 
He is the Living God, Father to all His children. 

One is assured that faith that Christ was God 
come to earth to show to men the perfect life of 
man is the right faith. 

He is assured that faith in personal immortality 
is right, and that the personal powers which help 
him in his man's work are his own immortal powers. 

He can understand the wisdom and love of God's 
purpose that permits no life to fail utterly, though, 
being finite, possessing only finite wisdom, and being 
free to use his will as he wishes, he may choose to 
use it wrongly this time on earth. But one man's 
life is but a breath in immortality, and God's love 
gives to every life the opportunities that it needs. 
And the life made able to learn from the conse- 
quences of its mistakes of free will finally does learn 
to fulfill God's will of its own free choice. 

This does not mean that the life is forced to be 
worthy. Forced worth is impossible thought. Nor 
does it mean that God translates the life to the 
Heaven of freedom from earth unless it has of its 
own free will made itself worthy of freedom. 
Heaven must be earned by the life's own work for 
it. Free will brings responsibility for its right use. 
Earth is life's first working place. By life's work 
on ?arth it earns the Heaven of wider life. By 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 33 

man's work on earth the life of man wins the firm 
will and purpose that it uses in the wider life's 
work. For the Heaven of freed life is no world 
of idleness. Life there has more to do than to 
twang a harp eternally. Life there must earn its 
wider and yet wider Heaven by its own work for it. 

Why is life made free in will and purpose? Be- 
cause God chose to make the life not His puppet, 
but His child. Because He chose to give to life 
the joy of personal achievement, the joy of struggle 
crowned by success, the joy of freed life won by 
itself, the joy of eternal growth by itself achieved. 

These thoughts are but a beginning of the thought 
which one may find in the word given to us by 
freed lives. 

Let us apply the word, for example, to present 
world conditions. How were they brought about? 
By perverted use of free will. It is not necessary 
to go into details of the conception and attempted 
carrying through of a war which had for its object 
the conquest of the world by force. The war was 
not an obligation upon the people who began it; it 
was voluntary. And to the rest of the world it was 
free will gone mad. As the war proceeded, the fal- 
sity of the ideals which brought it about was plainly 
shown, and high ideals of justice, humanity, and 
duty occupied men's minds as never before in the 



34 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

world's history. Men are but finite, and it is per- 
haps not surprising that in the years following the 
war those high ideals have been tarnished by per- 
sonal and national selfishness. But those high ideals 
will never be wholly forgotten. God's law for man- 
kind is progress toward higher things. By men's 
mistakes mankind learns wisdom. Has it not always 
been so since history began? Was there ever in 
man's history a threatening crisis that did not result 
in the spread of higher ideals? God utilizes men's 
mistakes of free will in teaching them wisdom. 

When we think, as we cannot help but think, of 
the misery brought by the war, of the untold thou- 
sands of men killed, and of the grief of those to 
whom they were dear, then is the faith in God 
brought to us by this word from wider life help in- 
deed. Did God purpose the war? That cannot be. 
But He permitted it by making men free to use 
their wills to the hurt of others. But, by making 
man's life as He did make it, He provided that 
no hurt that men may suffer on earth, not even death 
of mortal body, can permanently harm the immortal 
self of man. They are not dead, those brave sol- 
diers who fell in the war; they live. If they were 
ready for freedom they have entered into wider 
life, and who can measure God's mercy and for- 
giveness in His judgment of life's worth? If they 



A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 35 

were not ready for freedom, they will come back 
to a world made better by their suffering, come 
back to live another life of man, come back to an- 
other opportunity and, finally, and surely, they 
will win their freedom. Keep firm your faith, then, 
ye mourners, your loved ones are in their Father's 
care. 

The two thoughts which form the foundation of 
this word from higher life are — the Supremacy of 
the Infinite will and purpose that all the universe 
must obey, and the finite greatness of the personal 
self of man, who by his finite will and purpose 
fulfills the Infinite Will and Purpose for his life. 
There is no evading the fact and importance of per- 
sonality. Men live necessarily a social life ; but no 
twisting of the truth that lies at the bottom of the 
idea of Socialism can evade the fact that the 
"Brotherhood of man" is a brotherhood of personal 
selves, each one individual in his powers, his capac- 
ities, and his character. There is a half truth in 
the idea of Communism, but personality makes 
real Communism an impossibility. There is solid 
truth in the idea of justice between capital and labor, 
but that truth cannot be made effective and leave 
out personality. The very fact and necessity of 
leadership on both sides proves the importance of 
personality. 



3 6 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

The ideas that move men are first personal ideas 
vividly set forth in personal words. The work that 
brings to mankind progress is made effective by 
personal will and purpose. Personal will and pur- 
pose make man's world go. 

Man lives on earth; his life is an immortal per- 
sonal self; and through the work of man in which 
he uses all the immortal powers of his immortal 
self, he earns his first wider life ; and, in that wider 
life, the universe his working place, his companions 
other selves who have also won their freedom from 
earth, he earns by his own use of the same personal 
powers which he used on earth his wider and yet 
wider life and worth through the eons of immortal- 
ity. 

It is big thought, it is wonderful thought that the 
freed lives give to us men who feel ourselves so 
weak, and little and circumscribed. And it is given 
to us with the authority of "those who know." 

And, if we will have it so, it will emancipate us 
from weak will, weak purpose, and weak faith, and 
spur us to the personal work that will win for us 
the wider life. 



practical 0ppItcatton of Jfreeb 

lilies* ^fnlosopfjp in t&fytk 

0m Morbs 



$racttcal application of Jfreeb Hibe£' 
$f)tlo£opi)2> in ©fjeir (©ton Mtorta 

TTN the first part of this volume I have given a 
/</ resume of the main truths in the word given us 
for help by personalities in the life beyond earth. 
Their word is not yet completed, for there is more to 
come. When the Fourth Volume of the word thus 
far given was finished in 191 5, I naturally expected 
that they would at once begin another volume, but, 
much to my surprise, I was informed that their 
book-making must be discontinued at least until the 
war was over, for so many lives were coming over 
from earth, suddenly launched into new and be- 
wildering conditions and environment, that the time 
and thought which would otherwise be used in mak- 
ing books must be devoted to helping those be- 
wildered lives to find themselves. 

But these friends, who had made me their fellow 
worker for help to men's thinking, did not leave 
me, but came each evening at our accustomed hour 
of meeting, and gave me personal counsel to aid me 
in living rightly the years which remain to me on 
earth. And they have enjoined upon me to write 

39 



40 A WORD FORTHELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

a paper embodying the counsel they give me for 
help, wishing it to be of help to others also. 

By their direction, then, I write this paper, in 
which I quote from their word passages especially 
helpful to me, adding to each passage the name of 
its author; and also commenting from time to time 
in my own words upon the thought in the passages. 

I have already told my firm, unwavering faith 
that the books which I have written at their dicta- 
tion, and published by their direction, are just what 
they claim to be, a word for help from real person- 
alities who were once men, who now are living the 
wider life beyond earth, who earned their personal 
freedom from earth and, as friends, wish to show 
men how to earn their personal freedom. I believe 
that I have ample reason for that faith. And I have 
the same firm faith in the authorship of the passages 
which I quote in this paper. 

Personal friends my fellow workers are to me, and 
with full heart I thank God for their friendship. 

The thought in the passages is that which will aid 
a man in forming and maintaining high personal 
character, such as will make him not only master of 
his work, and captain of his soul while he lives on 
earth, but will also fit him to enter upon the per- 
sonal wider life, of wider work, greater worth, and 



APPLICATION OF FREED LIVES' PHILOSOPHY 41 

loftier aspirations which follows a well lived man's 
life on earth. 

And such a word, pertinent always, is especially 
pertinent now. While the war was raging men 
realized that it was a contest for the sovereignty 
in the world of high ideals. Men fought, and suf- 
fered, and died for ideals higher than those of ma- 
terial success, economic advancement, might as 
right, and, at home and abroad, the discipline and 
sacrifice made necessary by the struggle meant gain 
in personal character. 

But in one short year after the war all finer les- 
sons that it taught seem to be forgotten, ideals are 
laughed at, and selfishness — personal selfishness — or- 
ganized selfishness — national selfishness comes to 
the front. Personal character, except as it means the 
ruthless strength that brings material gain, whoever 
else may lose thereby, seems to be a forgotten ideal. 
The thought that when one sets out deliberately to 
do less than his best he loses immeasurably in per- 
sonal character is, to millions on millions of men, 
hardly worth even a sneer. If the world is to grow 
better, men cannot take that stand. 

And so this word of counsel is especially pertinent 
now. 

In the passages quoted the main thought is re- 



43 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

peated in many ways. It is hammered in with 
sharp and forceful strokes. Many of the passages 
are condensed sermons, and the injunction is to 
think beyond the words, to think what the counsel 
means to the particular man who reads, who has his 
own personal problems of work and life to deal 
with. 

And, though it is counsel given to me, it is broad 
enough, and intended to be broad enough to help 
you also. 



& Prtef ft&ume of tije iWam ^ijousllt 

/TjtVAN lives the earth life preparing there, by his 
/J)^* work, and his use of the powers willed to him 
as life, for his personal wider work and life in 
freedom from earth. 

Man's work is part of the work of immortal life. 
Man's powers — mind, will, purpose, memory — are 
the powers of personal life immortal. 

Man, who is life on earth, must find the firm will 
and purpose by which life wins its worth on earth, 
and its higher and higher worth to eternity. 

Firm, right purpose must be found by man, or 
his life is not ready for freedom, but returns to 
earth for further teaching. 

Man is made personal life, and willed by his 
Maker the free powers of personal self; therefore 
he fulfills God's purpose for his life on earth by 
his wise use of those free powers. Man therefore 
chooses for himself whether his life be *freed, or 
return to earth for another man's life and work. 

Man's life wins freedom from earth by man's 
work for it. 

The Maker of Life helps life to fulfill His pur- 
pose. 

43 



QHje <©uoteb ^asKage* anb Jfflp Comment 

^ff^HE passages repeat the thought in many dif- 
^"^ferent wordings. This is evidently done with 
purpose. In the compilation, where they are all 
put together, the repetition is noticeable. In the 
hearing from day to day for many days each one 
appealed to the mind with its own especial force. 

The Proverbs of Solomon repeat the thought; 
Marcus Aurelius repeats. 

And the injunction to the hearer is to think from 
the counsel given to his own problem of a right 
life on earth. 

I do not attempt to classify the passages, but 
quote them nearly in the order in which they were 
given to me from day to day. Nor are my com- 
ments from time to time efforts to write an essay 
of my own, but examples of the thought which a 
man would find who obeys the injunction to think 
from the word told him to thought of his own. 

In these passages "life freed" means life freed 
from earth forever. 

For life freed think, but think for mans life also. 

Dr. Coulter. 

44 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 45 

Keep firm, we make the burden of our word. 

MUtiades. 
Please God, we help more than Will. We love 
this work with you. We thank Him who permits it 
to us. His work we think, we hope we do. 

Wilberforce. 
Will, it helps you to think what you, wishing to 
win freed life, must be while you finish this man's 
life. What that is, think out, man Will, for then 
purpose will help you. 

Dr. Coulter. 
This thought helps me: — Will that we use helped 
life while it was man. That will, kept firm, wins 
for us the wide life which God purposes for life 
freed. We hold firm that will, knowing what firm 
will brings us. This thought helps me too: — My 
wide life I won myself. 

For you I talk to help you win this wide, full, 
free life. Keep firm while you finish mans life; 
while life is, then, thank God. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Put force in purpose. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Live in the present for the future. 

MUtiades. 
This thought helps me — this life, wide, free, 
happy life, is by mans purpose won. By purpose 



46 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

personal is life made worthy. His will who gives 
man life personal makes life's will personal the 
means by which His purpose for life is fulfilled. 
Word full with help. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Thank Him who purposes work as help for life. 
Thank Him by working full with firm purpose. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Hope, but work for this wide, full, free, happy 
life. 

Eleanora. 
Would thinking for this life win it? — only 
thinking I mean. Will for this life means work. 

Take this word from life freed — what you think 
well, do. But for this life keep firm of purpose. 
Well for life we will, because life won firm purpose 
on mrth. To win for life firm purpose is to win 
help that lasts for all life. 

Miltiades. 

Have we men ever thought of that? "To win 
for life firm purpose is to win help that lasts for 
all life!' 

Could any man make that statement as fact? 
Could any man know it is truth ? We may surmise 
that the life needs purpose beyond earth, but we 
cannot know; it is a truth of the wider life's 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 47 

knowledge. And think a moment what the truth 
told is. The life, a continuing personal self, learns 
and must learn while it dwells in man on earth, 
firm purpose, and must learn to keep it firm and 
use it well. And that firm, wise purpose won by 
man helps the continuing life not only on earth, 
but through its wider life to eternity. 

This thought helps life freed — Will for life 
worthy won while life is man holds firm while life 
is. This life wills for yet wider life, using the firm 
will that it won while it was man. 

Dr. Coulter. 

What life wins this high, full, freed life? Mans 
life when with firm purpose man wills to keep firm 
and worthy. What worth must the man find? His 
mans worth. What is worth? Life learns by 
God's purpose what worth is. 

This is hard to make plain. A man has high 
ideals of worth. He wishes to live up to his ideals; 
that is for him worth. Yet far more than mans 
thought is life's final worth. 

Keep firm; think what to will; be firm of purpose 
always; do that which you know is worth while. 
Hard work, full of purpose, wins this life. 

Dr. Coulter, 

Purpose for life high. While this man wills keep 



48 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

firm purpose at work. "I will" wins higher life, 
for "I will" keeps life worthy. 

Keep "I will" working. Weak purpose delays 
freedom. 

Miltiades. 

Fart of worth is work well finished. 

Miltiades. 

This thought helps us — Will of finite life, finite 
will then, fulfills His will who gives life. His will 
helps finite life. He purposes for finite life, yet 
makes finite life free. My will, then, if I wisely 
use it, fulfills God's will. 

Think, O man. You, the man, win for you, the 
life, your full, wide, free, worthy life beyond mans 
life by your wise use of your own will. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Thank Him who purposes for life work. Firm 
work helps life to win freedom. 

Miltiades. 

Good work for this life means zvill firm, purpose 
firm, life firm to mans life finished. Happy then 
the life will be, to eternity happy. Worth the work 
of man, is it not? 

Luther. 

Think, O man, think — what you will, life wills. 
Remember that. Will for this full, high, wide, 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 49 

free life then, till you finish mans life on earth. 
Keep firm, keep firm. 

Miltiades. 

For high life purpose. Work for this life with 
firm will, for then I know you win this life, for I 
know that firm will has, and by God's purpose will 
always win this high life. 

Wilberforce. 

This life for which I will, firm while I win the 
high worth that permits yet higher life, was won by 
firm purpose. Wide life is when firm purpose has 
won freedom from earth. 

Earn this life, O man. Man himself wins firm 
purpose; man himself wins for his life this firm, 
wide, full, free, happy life. 

Remember this: by your firm purpose must your 
life win freedom. 

Wilberforce. 
For what was purpose to-day the help it must be? 
Hear this: — Purpose, to be worth while, works for 
its object. You wish your life freed; work then 
for that, full of purpose. What was work to-day? 
What thought found you by reading? What has 
thinking for life brought to you of help? What 
has our word brought of thought? Has firm pur- 



50 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

pose been kept firm? Ask yourself. To win this 
life you need firm purpose with work. 

Heed the word, then I help you. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Will for this life. Full with purpose work to 
this mans life finished. To the man who wishes 
his life freed we talk. We tell that man, by his 
purpose kept firm, wins for his life this freed life. 
This man finds the help from our thought which 
he wishes to find. He wins this life if he 
profits by the word. He wins for his personal life 
wide, full, free, happy life, if he keeps firm while 
he lives this mans life. 

For you we talk to help you. Profit by our word. 

Wilberforce. 

This life works for its wider life. This word to 
you I give — work for the first wider life; then, by 
that will which wins it, work for yet wider life. 
Let this time of mans life free your life; then thank 
God while life is. 

Dr. Coulter. 

For this life purpose while you finish your mans 
life. This time win firm purpose, for then, by that 
firm purpose which this man has won this life zvins 
its first high life, and to this life will come full 
of firm purpose to win yet higher life. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 51 

Keep firm then. Use time with purpose; use 
life with purpose. Keep working worth while 
work; keep thinking for life; keep willing for life 
freed. 

Miltiades. 

We find life worthy by our own will. You will 
for your life its worth. Keep full of firm will 9 
then; that keeps life worthy. But mans will is 
weak many times. Then pray for His help who 
helps life. Pray, but will for yourself that your life 
keep worthy. Would you think you may be weak 
of will yet win this life? While you weakly pur- 
pose you keep life waiting for freedom. Work for 
this life to-day, to-morrow ; while you live mans life 
work for life freed. Think what you lack; find 
that. Keep firm to-day, to-morrow, while you live 
mans life. 

Help this life to keep firm, with him I pray, O 
God. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Let this thought help you: — You work as men 
work; use that work for help to purpose. You live 
mans life; use the time profitably. Work for high 
thought, work for help, work for firm purpose. 
Work well that work which you have. Purpose 
that by that work you be help to men. Work for 



$z A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

this life means — live mans live worthily, helpfully, 
well. 

Miltiades. 

For this life work. Happy hope this life gives 
you. This life helps you to win freedom. Happy 
work make your work for life freed; for your hope 
thank Him who permits you this word from life 
freed. Keep working; work your mans work well; 
work for firm purpose; work for help; work for 
worthy life. Thus work for life freed to your mans 
life finished. 

What better word could I give you? What 
better hope? 

Wilberforce. 

This morning ask His help who purposes for life 
forever. By His help life wins freedom. Well for 
life purposes He; His purpose makes life worthy by 
the will He gives life. Thank Him, O man. 

Dr. Coulter. 

What has purpose been this day? What help 
for life was it this day? Has life profited by the 
time used this day? Has life yet found firm, un- 
wavering purpose? 

Dr. Coulter. 

Happy hope we give you. Think, Will. I who 
work this wide lifers work, I who live this high life, 
help this man. Profit by my help, for then your life 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 53 

wins freedom. Keep full, firm and working this 
mans purpose. Then live high life, thanking Him 
who purposes for you that by life's own purpose 
life help itself to freedom. 

Wilberforcc. 

WUU for this life purpose, full of firm purpose. 
Keep thinking what your life lacks. Now you live 
mans life. Work for high life while your life 
works as man. Keep firm, man Will, for then high 
life, freed life, full life, happy life waits you. For 
life worthy be firm, for life thinking high thought 
be firm, for life working well be firm; thus life 
helps itself, thus life wins freedom. Firm to-day, 
to-morrow, firm always live this mans life. 

God, we pray Thee, help this man to keep firm. 

Wilberforce. 

For you I talk, meaning to tell what you need 
for help. I talk, prodding you to will for this life. 
Will for this life I tell you for help; purpose for 
this life I tell you for help; keep firm I tell you for 
help. When we mean to help you why think we 
prod too much? 

When you win this life we work with you. Has 
that been fully understood by you? Yes, I think 
you understand that. While you work with us 
work will be partly for help; that I think you under- 
stand. When you win this life your purpose has 



54 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 



won it. That you understand. When you win 
this life purpose keeps firm while life is; that you 
understand. 

Then we give you many helpful thoughts. Profit 
by them, man Will. Then Will, the life, wins 
high, full, free, happy life beyond this mans life. 
Will for that, purpose for that. Fit yourself while 
you work as this man for your freedom. 

Thank Him who permits you this help. Thank 
Him by life worthy. Then happy, free, you live 
thanking Him while life is. 

What for life this day? is the thought which helps 
you if you regard it. Keep firm always, helps you 
if you regard it. God help you, Will. With you 
I pray. 

Dr. Coulter. 

For what was purpose well used this day? Work 
of business. That work wins for you purpose; work 
that work well. But seek more than that work. 
Use life well; use mind well; thus life helps itself 
to freedom. 

Miltiades. 

Has purpose worked for life freed this day? 
Was life helped by will this day? How would a 
life who wishes freedom work? Keep thinking, 
Will; thus find what your life lacks. 

Dr. Coulter. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 55 

Pray when weak; prayer firms purpose. He who 
wills for life helps life who prays, wishing to be 
what he prays for help to be. 

Wilberforce. 

For life who prays God wills His help; but 
prayer, to win His help, is honest prayer. For that 
for which I pray I will myself. Keep working for 
life freed, wishing God's help, thanking Him for 
free will. 

Eleanora. 

Think why free life has work to do. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Firm will of life itself must win for life its free- 
dom. Firm purpose of life itself, free while life is 
working for itself, when it uses well and wisely 
the time, opportunity, powers of life, wins for life 
its worth. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Think now to win this life. Know well your 
lack. Then put force in purpose to win that which 
you know you lack. 

Wilberforce. 

Will for life worthy works. Firm always, we, 
lives freed, will for the worth by which life wins 
yet higher life. This word means to the life who 
wills on earth that which it means to us. Will for 
life worthy, kept firm, makes that life who thus 



5<* A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

wills ready for life higher. Will for life worthy, 
kept firm, wins for life its first high life. Then 
will for life worthy kept firm means for you, the 
life who is man now, the higher life of freedom 
from man and earth. Wide life, full life, happy 
life will for life worthy wins. 

Dr. Coulter. 

While life wills its work itself, He who made 
lif$ finite helps the finite will. Work for life freed, 
firm of will; work then helped by the Father of 
Life. 

Miltiades. 

For this life will while you finish this mans work. 
Use life well; use life's powers well; work for life 
with your best; then y helped by your Father, win 
freed life. 

Wilberforce. 

Keep working fof fine thought; think hard; work 
for mind. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Think what we tell — work for life freed; work 
that life be worthy freedom; work that life merit 
life wide. The full meaning of that word seek. 
Think what life must work for to win freedom. 
Think what life must be to win freedom. Then 
happy work make your work for life ffeed. 

Miltiades. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 57 



For life freed work; that helps will. For life 
freed work; that helps purpose. Work that life 
may be worthy freedom; work that life win while 
life wills as man that full, wide life purposed for it 
by life's Maker; work for this firm, high, full, wide, 
worthy life. Work how? We have told you how. 
Keep working for high thought, keep working for 
life worthy, keep firm will, firm purpose; seek that 
which thought tells you you lack. Work for life 
freed. 

Think what you have — help from life freed. 
Thank Him who permits you this help. Thank 
Him by worthy life; thank Him by winning your 
worth yourself for this life. Work for life freed 
while you work as this man. 

Wilberforce. 
Will, I think what thought to tell you that will 
help you, Profit by my word; then we work to- 
gether. Happy work let us make our work together 
for your life freed. 

Eleanora. 
What man finds full of help we find full of help. 
Man finds faith in Higher Purpose help; we, too, 
find help in this faith. We live wider life, yet 
remain the life that was man. 

Dr. Coulter. 



58 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

Here is evidence that the wider life is but a 
continuation of the personal life of self. "What 
man finds full of help, we find full of help." But 
in the wider life it is not the little things and the 
little thoughts which help, but the greater things 
and thoughts which concern the whole immortal 
life. 

For thought this morning, this: — Will which 
helps life man finds, for he finds for life its first will 
firm. His will, that power of personal self, wins 
for life its first high worth. That first worth wins 
for life its first wider life. Will that man finds, 
then, makes life worthy freedom. 

Thank Him who purposes for life for whom He 
wills worth that by will its own it win that worth. 
He who wishes this life will work for it, firm of 
will. 

Dr. Coulter. — Sunday Morning. 

This life works firmly because it won firm will 
there where you can win the like firm will. 

Miltiades. 

Work that man has helps life. Keep working 
that work, for what man learns through his work 
helps life higher. Work that man has, well fin- 
ished, wins purpose that helps life freed. Work 
mans work then, full of firm purpose, yet think 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 59 

beyond mans work; think for life wider. For help 
use that purpose zvon through work. Keep working 
both mans work that helps this man, and the work 
for personal character which makes life worthy. 

Dr. Coulter. 

"I will" helps life to its first worth, helps to its 
worth while life is, helps man, helps life freed. 

Miltiades. 

Keep working for this life freed. Think welU 
work well. For this life purpose now. To-day is 
yours; to-day has helped if you worked for this life 
firm of purpose. 

Think what help our Father permits you. 

This life Will, was man many times. Find firm 
purpose this time, life Will; but firm this time 
means work. Means work for what? Think for 
what. I help you if you work. I wish* to help 
you now. Think for this life, work for this life, 
purpose for this life, firm now, firm, while you 
finish mans life this time; then I help you. 

Eleanor a. 

"This life Will was man many times." Here is 
presented a truth, reincarnation, which men have 
surmised, but could not of themselves know. But 
for those who live the wider life it is not theory, 
but personal experience. 



60 fi WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

Wilt, work to find the meaning for you of the 
thought — this life wills its worth by the will by 
which it won mans worth. Find much in that. 
This thought, too, make subject of your thought — 
man wills his life worthy using the will that he, 
the life, will use for his higher worth. Find much 
in that. Think from that to your will now. Man 
Will, this life helps you if you think. What man 
purposes life purposes. To the man who thinks I 
talk. You find the work which* helps your life. 
Keep full of purpose; then we help you. This life 
helps this man; thank Him who permits this man 
the help from life freed. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Has firm purpose kept working this dayf Has 
life found help through your work this dayf Re- 
member that you work for this life. Keep working 
as life who wishes this life. Has your work made 
you think helpfully to-day? Was this day proof 
of firm purpose? Keep thinking what you lack; 
keep working for that which' you lack; keep think- 
ing what life must be to win this life. 

Dr. Coulter. 

For this life purpose to your life of man finished. 
Keep firm to live worthily, keep firm to live helping 
many; keep firm to live as life would hoping, will- 
ing, thinking^ working for freedom. Wide this life 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 61 

will be when you have won it; full this: life will be 
then. Work for high worth; seek work that helps 
life; keep firm to this mans life finished. 

Wilberforce. 

To be worthy this life needs your firm will; to 
win this life means work for it. Keep firm, Will. 
Work for this life, for then we meet when you 
finish this mans life, to part not through the whole 
of life. To win this life means firm purpose while 
you live mans life. 

Eleanora. 

Have you been helped by purpose to-day? For 
what were you helped? For business, I hear. 
That was help, for purpose firmly and well used 
helps life, but what for high thought this day? To 
help life means to well use the faculties of life, 
will, mind, purpose. Mind repays work; will helps 
life; purpose helps life. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Work for life freed means work, not listless 
waiting for the worth that wins life freed. Life 
freed is won by personal work. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Think what work wins for you — this life, freed 
life, happy life, full life. Would weak work, weak 
purpose win life freed? Think. 

Miltiades. 



6a A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

Were God to make your life worthy, what per- 
sonal worth would you find? Work for life worthy 
yourself. 

Wilberforce. 

When with firm will, kept firm, man works for 
life freed, he fulfills his part in freeing his life. 

You want help; pray for it; will to be helped, 
then you find help. 

To firmly use this mans life needs but your own 

"i wiiir 

Dr. Coulter. 

This morning worship heartily. The worth of 
life is helped by worship of life's Maker. With the 
thanks we owe to our Maker we will join prayer 
for His help to keep life worthy, and His will to do 
while life is. We will thank Him for life, for His 
purpose for life, for His will for life that it win its 
worth itself. We worship this morning with you. 
Dr. Coulter. — Sunday Morning. 

What was purpose to-day f Weak partly, you 
know. But purpose, to win life freed, will be firm 
to the man's life finished. What was will this day? 
Firm partly. For you I talk, hoping to help you. 
Will you be helped? What have you found of 
thought helpful to-day? Your answer "little" 
means weak work. Firm be while this man wills, 
then thank God while life is. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 63 

Will to help more than yourself. Help willed 
wins God's help. Think what you write — God 
helps him who wills for help. Keep working mans 
vjork, winning from it help. Think for life freed 
too. Work for life freed, firm always. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Faith helps will; faith helps life; faith helps man 
to win for his life freedom. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Weak life keeps thinking, perhaps to-morrow I 
keep firm; that helps little. To-day keep firm; then 
have help for to-morrow. Weak, you live mans 
life again; not weak, you live life freed. 

Wilberforce. 
O man, to-day you have; to-day work for this 
life; to-morrow you may not have. Hemember that. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Will to think. Tart of life's worth is mind 
thinking well. Keep thinking then. 

Dr. Coulter. 
You will for life freed by mans will. By that 
will you must win the freed life. Think what life 
working well for life freed would be, what work it 
would be planning, what future working for. Be 
firm to-day, to-morrow, all days be firm. 

Miltiades. 



64 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

Firm to-day, firm to-morrow, firm always be. 
Work for this life, firm to win it; keep thinking, 
firm to work mind; keep willing, full with firm 
purpose. Seek worth. Firm of will work that you, 
the man, win for your life the high, full, free, 
worthy life of higher purpose, wider worth, fuller 
vision than man has. 

Wilberforce. 

He who wills for life helps him who keeps firm 
himself. "I will" helped by life's Maker, wins this 
life. Remember that always. 

Eleanora. 

Thank God for free life. Thank Him while 
free will works to fulfill His purpose. He helps 
life while life works to fulfill His will. 

Eleanora. 

(f For life freed work" tells that by will your own 
must you win that life. Would I will for you? 
Could I? No. You must win life freed, willing 
your worth yourself. 

Miltiades. 

What was purpose to-day f How was time used? 
Ask yourself, for thus you will understand your 
failures. Think what you lack; thus find weak 
places. 

Eleanora. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 65 

You like Philosophy ; work at that for part cf 

your work. You like business; make that part of 

your work. But think for life wide, purpose to 

know what you, the man, lack; then find that. Help 

for life work is. Then work all work firm of 

purpose. _. „ y 

Dr. Coulter. 

Work like a man who wishes work to help his 

Miltiades. 

Hear this: — For life freed work to your mans 
life finished. Could better word be told youf We 
purpose to help you. Think what this life, now 
man, wins by firm purpose. Could better word be 
told you? 

Why for life think? You know why. Why for 
life find purpose? You know why. Work for life 
freed. No better thought can we give you. 

Wilberforce. 

To work is to wofk. When one works for life 
freed, to work needs firm purpose, to work needs 
firm will in all, to work needs one's best. 

Dr. Coulter. 

The work you have, well and firmly done, helps 

toward life freed. rrr^i r 

Wilberforce. 

Take work seriously. Take work for life freed 

seriously. ^ ^ , 

Dr. Coulter. 



66 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

Keep working all work firth of purpose. Work 
life's work thus, both mans business work and your 
work to keep life worthy. 

Miltia'des. 

I will call attention here to the sanity and health- 
fulness of their word as counsel to the man who 
works. "Work well the work that you have," 
they say, and make it help to firm purpose which 
life needs. "Work teaches when well done and 
well finished. " 

Their counsel might be put into everyday words 
thus: "Don't belittle your man's work; it is part 
of life's work. Put thought into your man's work, 
and also into your work to win your wider life, 
and keep your man's purpose firm in both, for as 
the man purposes his life purposes, since the man 
is the life on earth. The main object of your 
teaching on earth is that you be prepared to enter 
into the wider life, and that your powers, which 
are the powers of immortal life, be prepared for the 
wider life's thought and the wider life's work. 
Don't think that you can win the heaven of freed 
life by dreamy contemplation. That heaven must 
be earned, and it must be earned by doing all your 
work well. The Lord made you able to work, and 
gave you, the man, the immortal powers of immor- 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 67 

tal personal self. He made you free, and by your 
own wise use of all your immortal powers you fulfill 
His purpose for your life on earth, that you make 
yourself ready for wider life. You will fulfill His 
purpose finally, for that purpose is Omnipotent. 
Why not be wise, and do your part now, this time 
of life on earth? And the man's work that you 
have, business, labor, writing, teaching, preaching, 
fighting for your country's and for humanity's high 
ideals, in which man's work you use your life's 
powers, mind, will, purpose, memory, is part of your 
immortal life's work. Upon you is placed the 
responsibility to do that work with your best, as 
well as to keep your man's life from unworthiness, 
for the Lord made you able to fulfill His purpose, 
and He made you free. Keep firm, then, keep firm 
in all your work. Sane and wholesome always is 
this counsel that comes to us from the world beyond 
earth. 

Tell for men the word from life freed. Tell it 

for others, for you have heard it from life freed. 

Tell for help to other men the thought which helps 

you, a man. ^ ~ , 

J Dr. Coulter. 

Think for this high life. Will as you think 

would keep your life worthy. rj/ .„ , 

Wilberiorce. 



68 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

By your will you find life worthy. By your 
purpose you keep life worthy. Happy work make 
your work for life freed. 

Eleanor a. 

For freed life work, is the best word we may give 
you, a man. We tell you that for help. This, 
too, make a helpful word — Hope for life freed, but 
work for that for which you hope. Think what 
worth of life is. For you it will be — life full of 
purpose, working life, thinking life, willing life, 
firm always. 

Dr. Coulter. 

When weak, ask help. When weak, pray to God 
for His help. He answers honest prayer. To win 
His help you will for life worthy yourself. 

Miltiades. 

This thought helps me — Will of life itself wins 
the wider life which He who gives life purposes. 
Will of life itself wins for man, the life, the first 
wider life of freedom from earth. Will of life 
itself wins then wider and still wider life while life 
is. 

Mans will wins his first high life. His own will, 
his own high purpose, win for him that high life 
which God wills for him. The wise man wills for 
his life while he wills for his mans life. 

Dr. Coulter. 






THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 69 

Man wills his worth himself. No one but he 

may keep his life worthy; no one but he may will 

what his life become. Man himself must make his 

life worthy freedom or his mans life is not fulfilling 

God's will. ~ ~ . 

Dr. Coulter. 

For what fine thought worked you to-day? Will 
for life freed means thought high. Will for life 
freed means worth of the powers of life. Personal 
life wills in you. To live mans life well is to work 
well, to purpose for that which keeps life worthy, 
to will that man shall be what his fine thought 
tells him is worthy life. 

Keep that in mind. Think what you lack; think 
what life would be who wishes to be freed; then by 
firm purpose find that worth. You find it; no one 
but you can find it for you. 

Man, life, will, purpose, life freed, work; have 
you found the worth of thought on these? 

Think also for help; that thought helps man; 
that, too, make for thought an object. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Who thinks high thought finds high reward. 

Eleanor a. 

Keep mind busy with work; to work mind is to 
help life itself. No thinking makes mind worth 
having but fine thought. r> n r 



70 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

What work was fine to-day f Business, I hear. 
That is well, for business is part of mans work, 
which is life's work also. Yet work for fine thought 
also. Keep work for this life doing. What is that 
work? Ask yourself. To learn that is to find help 
for life itself. 

Help this life, I pray, Father of Life, his purpose 
help, his life help to find firm will, his life help to 
win life freed. For him I pray with him. 

Miltiades. 

For this life work. Keep firm, for that wins this 
first high life. 

My help I will to this man; this man has from 
life freed help, then. To have that help places a 
responsibility upon you. Thank God that you may 
have our help; then with firm purpose work for life 
freed. 

Miltiades. 

Find, then hold fast, firm purpose. 

Miltiades. 

When weak, pray for His help who wills for 
life. But you will for yourself your worth. Then 
why need His help? might be asked. Man wills by 
his mans will, for which fact his worth becomes 
evidence. He wills for life. Then his will, proved 
by his worth of life, fulfills God's pufpose. 

Miltiades. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 71 

This morning worship the Wilier of your life. 
Thank Him while you pray for His help. Will to 
he that which fulfills His will. For that purpose 
by which life keeps worthy, pray for His help. 
Dr. Coulter. — Sunday Morning. 

How would this man work for life freed? 
Would he wait to find firm purpose? Would he 
let will be weak? To work for this life is to work 

f0T tU Dr. Coulter. 

Think high thought; find work worth doing; 
keep mind working; for life freed work thus daily. 

Miltiades. 

"For life freed think" tells much. What life 
lives this man? World life, working that world 's 
work, thinking for wider life if he thus wills to 
think, working for life high if he thus wills to 
work. 

For this man what more helpful word? 

Miltiades. 

How would man work with purpose for life 

freed? Thus — he would be worthy wider life. 

Why then may man be worthy of only returning to 

earth? Free will is the reply. Keep firm of free 

will; thus win life freed. wr? , 

Wilberforce. 

From life high to life yet higher self wings its 

way when freed, itself the power which brings 



73 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

higher life, yet winning its higher life by God's pur- 
pose. What will helps life? Firm will. What 
purpose helps life? Firm purpose. Life wins its 
life freed by its free will; such is the high worth of 
willed personality. 

Dr. Coulter. 

God wills you wisdom found in the willed life 
of man; He wills that by its own free purpose life 
find that wisdom; He wills for life that high life 
which follows life of man; but man for that life 
purposes himself. What for life purpose will be 
depends on will to live mans life well. 

Wilberforce. 

This life wills for you its help. This life tells 
you, a man, thought which helps while you use it 
well. "Keep firm" helps if you keep firm; and 
"will for this life" helps if you so will; "Keep pur- 
pose high" helps if you thus keep your purpose; 
thus we help you. But man wills his worth him- 
self ; his worth is the worth he wills. His life wills 
that which he wills himself. Thus keep thinking; 
then life freed helps you. 

Dr. Coulter. 

How win firm purpose? By use. To win it 
means first your life freed from man, then life firm 
while it is. My word is help while you regard it. 

The man who wishes his life firm frees himself 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 73 

from weak purpose, frees himself by the firm free 
will which he himself uses. Remember this — Firm 
purpose is firm life. 

Luther. 

To-day , to-morrow, all days keep firm; only thus 
may man free his life from weak purpose. 

Eleanor a. 

Work finished helps man, helps life itself. Would 
man be working well for life freed while little 
things keep him busy? Work for life freed means 
life busy with right things. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Man lives working that work which prepares for 
wider life's work. That man who wills firmly 
for mans work prepares for higher life's work, yet 
that is but part of mans work. He who thinks 
what life means will think what beside the usual 
mans work life has to keep firm for. Part of worth 
is his work well finished, but only part. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Help when you may; seek that work which helps 
firm purpose; win for life firm purpose; keep from 
the weak times which hurt purpose; work for this 
life full of purpose to win that which brings worth 
to mans life. To win firm purpose work, to help 
many work, for life freed work while you finish 
this life of man. Keep firm to the mans life fin- 



74 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

ished. Then help from Him who wills for life 
you have. 

Miltiades. 
From life weak guard yourself; from will weak 
guard yourself; keep firm while your life is man; 
to this life come, then, worthy your freedom. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Make help part of your motive; but unselfish 
must be the will for help. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Work for life freed means this — work firm of 
will, firm of purpose, keeping life worthy, keeping 
life working worth while work, thinking high 
thought, living mans life well. 

Miltiades. 
Were life freed by Him who wills it to be per- 
sonal self without using its free power, will, what 
would life be? Puppet of its Maker; worth little 
beyond that. 

Wilberforce. 

Man is personal self. He is conscious of self- 
hood, of individuality. His powers are his own. 
No one can do his thinking for him; no one can 
use his will and purpose but himself; no one can 
feel his emotions, sweet or painful, but himself; 
no one can have just his character but himself. He 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 75 

is personal, individual self. And personal self he 
remains throughout his life on earth, and through- 
out his life of immortality beyond earth. His 
growth is his own growth ; his worth of worthless- 
ness of character is his own. And, being personal 
self, he is necessarily free to use his personal powers 
as he himself chooses. Man is thus made by Him 
who conferred upon him selfhood. 

But the Creator of Life, the Wilier of man's per- 
sonal selfhood, did not make man thus without a 
purpose in the creation. Himself the Life Infinite, 
"the Fullness of Personality," the life whom He 
made a personal self must be less than Himself, 
and therefore finite; the powers conferred upon 
the finite self must be finite, for there can be but 
One whose powers are Omnipotent; and the life 
made by Him a finite personal self must be, of 
necessity, free in the use of its willed powers within 
the limits of its willed finiteness. We must believe 
that He who made man a finite self knew what sort 
of a being He was placing in His universe; and, 
since Omnipotent Will made this being as He did, 
Omniscient Purpose follows the life of that being 
through all its willed existence, teaching it and 
helping it. But, since He made man free, finite, 
personal self, man must fulfill the Omnipotent Will 
and the Omniscient Purpose by his personal, free 



76 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

use of his own finite powers. Thus upon man him- 
self, while the immortal life is man on earth, upon 
life itself while it is (and life is to immortality), 
He places the responsibility, and to life itself He 
gives the ability, taught and helped by Him, to fulfill 
His purpose by its own finite, free choice. 

And that makes man's character his own personal 
lookout and his own personal achievement. Worlds, 
planets, suns roll in their allotted courses, subser- 
vient to God's will, and fulfill His purpose through 
His immutable laws which govern their finite, mate- 
rial realty. The life of man, the highest being 
created, sentient, thinking, willing, purposing, im- 
mortal, personal self, fulfills God's purpose on earth 
and forever by his own finite free powers and of his 
own free choice. 

But a personal, finite being, living alone on his 
earth, would find no meaning in his selfhood, no 
use for those faculties and emotions which are made 
part of him, no interest in the past, present or 
future. Could a hell for him worse than that be 
conceived? Therefore God peoples earth with man- 
kind, each one a personal self, each one to live a per- 
sonal and a social life; each to live individual life in 
mutual relations with his fellows. Made as he is, 
man cannot live alone, or for himself only, without 
atrophy of part of his being. Made as he is, a 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 77 

hermit's life is a supremely selfish one. He needs 
the intercourse and experience with other personali- 
ties in the development of his own personality. He 
needs the wisdom of others in the development o£ 
his own wisdom. He needs the clash of mind and 
will and purpose with other minds and wills and 
purposes. He needs the work of man, the struggle 
of man, the pleasures of man, the pains of man, in 
the development of his own powers and capacities. 
Earth made as it is, with all its wonderful re- 
sources, and man made as he is with all his wonder- 
ful powers, are suited to each other by the Wilier 
of both. The earth life of man is part of the 
immortal life of his personal self. The earth work 
and experience are part of the work and experience 
of immortal life; and the man who is immortal life 
uses them as he wishes, and learns through them if, 
and when, he thus chooses. 

We believe that God is omnipotent; we must 
think then that, if He thus chose, He could have 
peopled His universe with lives of finite perfection. 
We believe that he is omniscient. And our further 
thought would find that Omniscient Wisdom would 
not so do, for in an universe thus peopled the only 
activity would be that caused by the laws of matter 
and force. The living being of finite perfection, 
confronted always by the dead wall of his finiteness, 



78 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

possessed of all worth that a finite being could pos- 
sess, would have no use for thought, or will, or 
purpose. Since all lives would be at the dead level 
of finite perfection, there could be no individuality, 
no personality. None could have a wish, or a hope, 
or a regret. Life could have no interest, for there 
could be no attainment, no achievement. There 
could be no history, for past and present would 
be the same. There could be no work for one's 
self or others, no thinking, no contrasts, no possi- 
bility of being less than finitely perfect, no possi- 
bility of becoming more than finite. Can one con- 
ceive Omniscient Wisdom thus peopling an uni- 
verse? He could not have even had any interest 
Himself in His creation. 

A life created to have the perpetual sameness of 
finite perfection would be, as Wilberforce expresses 
it, "but the puppet of its Maker." And a life thus 
created would not be equal in dignity to a life made 
a finite, free, personal self, gifted with powers like 
those of his Creator, made able to learn through 
his own experience, made able to achieve the finite 
worth which his Maker purposes for him by his own 
free personal powers, made able to grow, by his 
own free will and purpose, though all the finite life 
of immortality. 

For a life of personal self its worth comes from 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 79 

its doing. The very thought of Creation brings 
with it the thought of the value of doing. God 
Omnipotent, Omniscient, Infinite in being, found, 
in the creation of an universe, a doing worthy of 
His Omnipotence. And we may reverently think 
that He designedly so created His universe and the 
finite beings who by His will people it, that its 
development and progress, and the development and 
progress of the finite personalities created by Him 
shall, in order to fulfill His purpose, call for His 
continued and Omnipresent doing. God the In- 
finite finds doing worthy of His Omnipotence. He 
made the life of mart a finite image of Himself. 
He willed that, for the finite life, its value shall 
come from its own personal doing. And He is 
always doing for the finite life, teaching it and 
helping it in its own doing. 

And the meaning and purpose of its doing are 
made evident by the capabilities of the mighty and 
immortal powers with which it is endowed ; powers 
which, though finite, are great enough to bring to 
the finite life, through its own doing, a wider and 
wider growth, through the ages of immortality. 

To leave work begun unfinished means weak 
purpose. 

Dr. Coulter. 



80 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

By life we testify to God's mercy to life. We 
live freed from man and earth. We live through 
Him who made us life. 

This thought will help you — will of life by which 
life wills as man is the help life needs. By it life 
wins its first high life; by it life wins that worth 
which God purposes. God's purpose for life will 
be fulfilled. You may fulfill it this time. 

Miltiades. 

Keep firm for your mans work, but think, while 
you finish that work, for life freed. Think how to 
live well the mans life; keep firm that purpose 
which helps life; keep faith firm. While work 
helps life, faith helps life too. Ml ' A 

For what was purpose well used to-day f Has 
life profited by high thought to-day? Was life 
helped by your work to-day? Has will brought 
help to purpose this day? This will help you to 
think what this life needs while he works as this 
man. Firm purpose life needs, both as man and 
when freed from man. When will falters put force 
in purpose. Keep firm yourself; then God helps 

y0U ' Dr. Coulter. 

Man lives few world years; self is personal life, 
immortal life. Then mans self lives, not the few 
world years of man, but forever, lives personal life 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 81 

while life is. Keep firm then, while life is man; 
then keep firm while life is. 

Eleanor a. 
To live well means life worthy, man helping 
his fellow men, will for life freed working, life 
helped by the Father of Life. Will for life freed 
wins it when will is kept firm. When life weakens 
life wills for mans life again. Will your own 
determines when you win life freed. 

Dr. Coulter. 

On September 28, 191 7, I received a letter in 
which the writer, a minister of the Gospel, says: 
"I am not so sure of your reincarnation theory, 
though it is interesting. ,, And I asked myself 
why men do not find that thought acceptable. The 
reply was — probably because they are not conscious 
that they have ever been men on earth before this 
time. But would not the thought be acceptable if 
they could realize with faith that God is not cruel, 
but just and loving, and that somehow He makes 
the reward of reincarnation greater than the pen- 
alty? 

When I got thus far with the thought it was 
time for the evening talk, and Dr. Coulter said this : 

"Will, that thought helps you to understand life 
of personality who lives more than once on earth. 



%z A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

That recompense of opportunity more than repays 
the work which it brings. That, Will, keep in 
thought. Why life lives as man you know. But 
that life is man more than once seems wrong unless 
the life finds opportunity ', when it needs that oppor- 
tunity, to make itself worthy life freed." 

Let us carry the thought a little further. 

In an universe so vast as this the forces must be 
commensurate with its vastness. An universe of 
huge worlds, to be an orderly universe, must be 
ruled by forces equal to the task. Those physical 
forces which pervade and keep in order an universe, 
are necessarily greater than the weak physical body 
of man can withstand. Those forces rule earth, and 
perhaps the man physical suffers from them. But 
God, who willed the universe into being and ordered 
its necessary forces, willed also that man, the life, 
the ego, the immortal self, shall be far more than 
man the physical. And though man the physical 
may suffer injury or even death, man the immortal 
life of self rises superior to that physical death. In 
God's wisdom the life of self in the physical body 
and in the earth environment, with its physical 
vicissitudes, and its mental and moral struggle, is 
necessary to the teaching of that immortal self. In 
God's justice the physical vicissitudes are but inci- 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 83 

dents which cause no permanent harm to the real 
self, and the mental and moral struggle is a help to 
finite wisdom which continues to be a help through 
all the finite life of immortality. 

The life whose opportunity for development on 
earth is cut short by sudden physical death, and the 
life who, misusing free will, misuses his opportunity, 
both need, and are both given by God's justice and 
His love, another opportunity in another man's life. 
And finally, through its God-willed opportunities, 
every life learns wisdom on earth, understands the 
responsibility which free will imposes, and of his 
free choice fulfills God's wise purpose that he win 
by his own work for it the worth which permits 
life freed. 

When thus we think of reincarnation, and thus 
we are taught to think by those for whom it is 
not theory, but experience, that puzzle which men 
have called "the problem of evil" is cleared from its 
puzzle, and our faith in God's justice and God's 
love becomes an understanding faith. 

This life works. Hard its work, perhaps, yet 
this life helps work by firm purpose. You must win 
firm purpose to win this life. 

Miltiades. 



84 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

"This life works." Here is a truth that we men 
could not know. Dr. Coulter says, "Nor you, nor 
any man, may know that which we tell for help." 
We may surmise it from the nature of man, but 
we can only surmise. And it is a most comforting 
assurance that the nature of personal self does not 
deteriorate in the wider life. The wise use of its 
powers means work, whether on earth or in the 
wider life. We are not told what the wider life's 
work is, except that help is part of it; we would 
not understand. But it is well to know that in the 
wider world, as well as here on earth, the life grows 
through work. 

/ would lose life rather than lose my hope. 

Eleanor a. 

This man works for his life. He wills for life 
freed if thus he wishes. His will makes his life 
worthy. His will, free for his work, brings life 
worthy or unworthy as he wishes. His life profits 
by his purpose if thus he wishes. Think then, what 
for life to-day was his will? Has his work been 
worth while? Has his will been firm while his 
work he did? Think. We live working here. 
You work that work by which life prepares for its 
high work if thus you wish. Keep work worth 
while being done; keep full of purpose; will that 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 85 

you, the man, win for yourself that worth by which 
life is made ready for freedom. 
Think, O man, think. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Has work helped life this day? Was high thought 
worked for this day? Was firm purpose worked for 
to-day? Not by weak purpose, by firm purpose will 
life win freedom. Will for that which you find you 
lack, firm of purpose; seek life worthy; work for 
life firm; only that work wins that firm purpose 
by which life frees itself. God helps while life 
works. By help of Him life keeps firm. 

Miltiades. 
Why has your life not yet won its freedom? I, 
who think what will help you, ask that question. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Will which you use to-day makes to-day worthy. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Keep work going. Hard work makes will firm. 
Remember, you live mans life to prepare for life 
higher. 

Wilberforce. 
Work hard. You need hard work. 

Miltiades. 
You must think for this life if your wish to win 
it is firm. 

Dr. Coulter. 



86 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

I want to help you to win this life; will you be 
helped? 

Dr. Coulter. 
Work for life freed means thinking, too. By 
work thoughtful life wins help. 

Dr. Coulter. 
While life is "I will" keeps life from weakness. 

Eleanor a. 
He who wills for life has seen the man who 
lives earth life. He watches earth life; His will 
helps life there, as man, till it is worthy this life. 
You live that mans life. Why? Think why. 

Wilberforce. 
Man lives few years, life lives to immortality. 
Would mans work help immortal life? Why was 
it made part of life's work? To help purpose, 
partly, life was willed mans work. 

Keep thinking; that helps life itself. Now think 
what I told you — keep thinking, for that helps life 
itself. 

Miltiades. 
To will for life worthy means thought of what 
worth is; keep that with you. 

Wilberforce. 
Think how to will that you be ready for death 
of body. 

Eleanor a. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 87 

Do work that is worth doing. Find your own 
notion of worth-while work. With purpose work, 
for thus firm purpose you learn. Put force in pur- 
pose to-day. 

Miltiades. 

Keep thinking what life worthy means. What 
your life needs your thought must be; how win 
this life your thought must be; what worth life 
finds; what earns life high. 

Wilberforce. 

Keep thinking for this life. What you lack make 
part of the thought; what worth of man should be 
make part of the thought. 

Worth I need not define. Your thinking tells 
you what mans worth of life would be, what would 
help that worth, what keeps man firm in worth. 
You need to think. Yet what worth of life is man 
but partly understands. His wise thinking will 
help him to understand. Will for wise thought 
helps man; work for fine helpful thought wins ideas 
of worth. Keep thinking, man Will. 

Miltiades. 

This morning worship heartily. With thought 
for life freed worship your Maker. His help you 
need to win this life. Who helps life? Life's 
Maker. Pray for His help while keeping firm 
yourself. The faith which helps life feel full and 



88 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

strong. Keep full, firm, faith your help while you 
work for life freed. 

Eleanor a. — Sunday Morning. 

This life works for itself its worth for yet wider, 
fuller life. You work for this life keeping firm both 
will and purpose. Wide life is when freed, high then. 
Life wills for yet higher life with the firm will 
which it won as man. Think, Will. By the firm 
purpose which life wins as man life freed wins all 
that He who wills for life purposes. High worth 
life wins when firm and full of purpose; yet, think- 
ing mans thought of worth it works as man, faith- 
fully for itself. 

Work full of faith, full of firm will, for thus life 
wins its freedom. Full of firm purpose be while 
you finish this mans work; all life, then, keep firm. 

Miltiades. 

Keep thinking for life, firm of will to think wisely. 
Keep wishing for life freed you may, yet willing to 
work as man till God wills you freedom. Hope, but 
work for life freed. 

Eleanor a. 

Work for life means thought kept working well, 
will kept working well, purpose kept working well. 
Those words I think worth keeping in mind. Work 
that life needs uses all the powers of life. 

Dr. Coulter. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 89 

Will is life's potent power. By it worth is found 
to eternity. You wish to find will that helps worth; 
you find it if you choose; you yourself find that 
worth. You will take pleasure of course; you know 
that is right. But to keep firm will to your mans 
life finished. Work full of firm purpose for this 
high life; then thank God while life is. 

Not wrong to play a little; but play must be for 
re-creation, or it becomes a burden to life. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Play not too much. Play will help if kept from 
weak indulgence. Play, yes, but work too. 

Miltiades. 

Keep work from littleness. What help from that 
work? Think for work worth doing. 

Miltiades. 

Think high thoughts. Fill your mans life with 
high thoughts. To think high thoughts helps life 
itself. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Life purposes, wills, lives, thinks, is, by God's 
permission. 

Eleanor a. 

Will is a function which man has. His will 
works for the thought which his mind tells him. 
Would will then be function of mind? Yes, life 
has will as being who thinks. Mind works, will 



90 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

works, purpose works. Mind tells man what to 
will, what to purpose. Mind functions in will that 
works to fulfill mans purpose. 

Miltiades. 
To work for life means to work by those powers 
willed to life by God. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Man's life is an enduring life, made by his Crea- 
tor capable of attaining all the greatness in thought, 
in knowledge, and in personal worth of character 
that a finite being may attain, gifted by his Creator 
with an insatiable "will to know" all that a finite 
being may know, and by that gift willed by his 
Creator to be a developing being. He is placed by 
his Creator in an universe which He also created,) 
an universe so vast, so prolific of knowledge to be 
attained; and he is willed by his Creator to find, 
through his experience and his reasoning mind, the 
first beginnings of thought so lofty, truths so pro- 
found, and worth of character so great that, "through 
the years of the immortal life's development there 
is always beyond him knowledge and thought, and 
truth, and wisdom, and character to which he may 
still aspire. And through all his life he learns, not 
by compulsion beyond the compulsion of his willed 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 91 

nature, but by intelligent, reasoned choice. And 
all the greatness purposed for him by his Creator 
is, and is to be, achieved by himself. So wonderful 
is the being and the future of the life who on earth 
is man. 

What worth while thought have you found to- 
day; what well thought out problem solved? The 
thinking which you find help is by the mind that 
life owns. Keep it working , keep it working hard. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Think, from the philosophy we tell, why life 
works, why life thinks, why life wills for itself its 
worth. Think what man wins by his firm purpose. 
Think what he is while he wills as man. Think 
for life high, then. Work for this life. Thus man 
frees his immortal life from man. 

That life who wills for it wins life high. Free, 
full, wide life is freed life. Work for it, work for 
it; then thank God while life is. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Will for help makes life happy. Will for this 
life makes life happy. Keep that thought in mind. 

Eleanor a. 

This morning worship heartily. For life thank 
Him who gives life; for will thank Him who makes 



9a A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

life win its worth itself; for purpose thank Him who 
helps purpose; thank Him heartily. 

Dr. Coulter. — Sunday Morning. 

For life thank Him who wills you life; for will 
thank Him. For you I talk, thinking how to help 
you. Think what you lack, for help I tell you; 
think what firm purpose wins, for help I tell you; 
think how you may help many, this for help I tell 
you. Think much, for life wins help by wise 
thought; that for help I tell you. 

Think what man works for — this full, free> wide, 
worthy life; that I tell you for help. Think well, 
work well, purpose well, firm to this mans life 
finished; that I tell you for help. Think what God 
wills for life who wills for itself worth. 

Has the word helped you? Thank God with me. 
We meet you at Church for worship, thanks, prayer. 
Miltiades. — Sunday Morning. 

Think what work for this life must be. While 
thinking put the thought to test by what you your- 
self must do to work for life freed well. To keep 
life worthy means what? For what must life work 
who works for life freed? For what life of man 
must man work? Keep thinking. To live mans 
life well means what to this man? To win life 
freed man works. For what life of man would 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 93 

you think you ought to work? We help you think, 
I hope. 

Put force in purpose, means what? Keep firm, 
means what? Think for life freed, means what? 
No one but you makes your life worthy. To work 
for life freed means to work for it. Put force in 
purpose means what it says. For what put force in 
purpose? Seek the answer yourself. 

Help this man to think, we with him pray, Father 
of Life; help him to think well. 

Dr. Coulter. 

To understand what free will means helps life. 

Eleanor a. 

The other night Eleanora, my wife, asked me 
some questions and asked me to write out my re- 
plies to them. Below I give both questions and 
replies. The replies tell in my own way thought 
which the word from life freed has helped me to 
find. I could not have replied, indeed I would not 
have been thinking such thought at all if I had 
not been helped by the word from life freed. 

"Why is self free?" Because the Wilier of Life 
made self personal, and personal self is necessarily 
free, or it would not be personal, individual self. 
Life created must be finite, and the finite personal 



94 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

self must be, within the limits of its finiteness, free 
to think, to will, to purpose, to work as it chooses, 
or there would be no value to itself in its existence. 

"Why does life work for itself?" Because 
thought, will, and purpose, the powers of life, would 
be of no value without expression. Work is the 
expression of thought, will, and purpose. Thought 
conceives, purpose plans, will executes through work. 
The value of finite life is potential. That value 
is never fixed, but always in the making. Omnip- 
otence wills, and it is done. Finiteness achieves 
through work of mind, will and purpose. Since 
finite life is made personal and therefore free, its 
achievement is its own. The law of finite life is 
development. Its development comes through de- 
velopment of its finite powers. They can only be 
developed by use. The thought, the work, the free 
choice of finite life, are essential factors in the devel- 
opment of its powers. When God made life per- 
sonal He willed that work be its portion because 
work is needed for its development. 

"Why does free life think?" Because, for finite 
life, thought is necessary to its understanding of 
itself, its powers, its environment, its opportunities; 
thought is necessary to understanding of its work 
and its experience ; thought is necessary to the wise 
use of its acquired knowledge; thought is necessary 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 95 

in its plans for its future ; thought is necessary in the 
formation of its ideals. 

"How would free life work?" If it be unwise 
it would work for the day only, careless, purpose- 
less and weak. If it be wise it would work "in the 
present, for the future," looking beyond the day, 
choosing strength of will, firmness of purpose, choos- 
ing to develop its powers by daily work of them all, 
choosing by wise will to keep itself worthy. 

"Why does free life make its worth personal?" 
Because, being personal life, its worth must be its 
own. 

"Why does free life purpose for life high?" Be- 
cause life is destined by its Maker to live life high, 
purposed by its Maker the worth that permits life 
high, willed by Him the powers that make it able 
to attain life high by its own work for it, made a 
reasoning life, and taught by its Maker with teach- 
ing that it needs until, through its experience, it 
learns wisdom to look at the stars instead of at its 
own feet of clay, and of its own free choice purposes 
for life high as the course which its taught wisdom 
dictates. 

"Why must free life be firm?" Because weak- 
ness paralyzes its powers, leaves its work unfinished, 
refuses the help of its Maker, penalizes the life by 
bringing it no growth. Because firmness is needed 



9 6 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

to do and finish its work well. Because firm life 
wins the help of its Maker to keep firm. Because 
the future of immortal growth purposed for it by 
its Maker must be achieved by its own firm, free 
work for it, and work means the firm, steady effort 
of all its wonderful powers. 

Firm will may but hold life to man. Keep think- 
ing what will kept firm would free life, what pur- 
pose kept firm makes life worthy. Work to under- 
stand your word from us. 

Miltiades. 

He only who understands what worth is keeps 
life worthy. Yet to tell what worth is would keep 
us busy. But you know what your life worthy 
would be. Keep thinking what life worthy for you 
would be, then work for that. God help this man 
with understanding. 

Wilberforce. 

Keep from the fault of weak life; keep from weak 
purpose. Why, you know; we have told you why. 
My will wins my worth; your will wins your worth. 
For my worth of life I keep firm; for yours you must 
keep firm to win freed life. 

Dr. Coulter. 

You live mans life; you will for that. But man 
lives but few world years; life itself lives while 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 97 

time is, while eternity is. Then remember that man 
works for this better life if he wills to have better 
life. 

Miltiades. 

From wisdom to wisdom to wisdom life rises 
when for itself it has won freed life. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Find will that will be firm through habit. 

Wilberforce. 

Think hard. Much work keeps mind full, and 
work of mind helps those faculties by which life 
keeps worthy. Keep thinking worth while thought; 
keep mind working; active mind thinks well. 

Dr. Coulter. 

To work for life freed means this — to will for 
life worthy, to will for life working as life is pur- 
posed to work, to keep firm, to feel right as the 
whole of life's duty, to make life worthy through 
this feeling, to keep firm while life works, to will 
for that which thought finds right, with that firm 
purpose by which will is kept firm to live. That I 
make my helping thought for this time. 

Dr. Coulter. 

For life freed work. To help you we talk. You 
understand that man lives man's life, works mans 
work, wills for mans well being, yet by that 
thought — for life freed work — / keep before you 



98 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

that life is more than world experience, is more than 
man. 

Miltiades. 
Work means work with thought of its meaning 
to the whole life. 

Miltiades. 
He who purposes work does it if his purpose is 
worth having. To will for work, but not do that 
work, weakens purpose. 

Dr. Coulter. 
No life wins freedom till worthy of it. 

Wilberforce. 
Fear only infirm purpose. 

Miltiades. 
To will is to work for that which one wills. 
Finish work begun; keep thought from little things; 
work for high thought; make life worth living; will 
for those things which help life; put force in purpose 
for all work. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Think for this life, firm of purpose to think for 
worth of mans life, for first worth of life freed 
means worth of life on earth translated to higher 
world. 

Miltiades. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 99 

He who lives his mans life keeping firm for 
what he understands is worth of life, has God's 
help. 

Dr. Coulter. 

That which man finds work He who purposes 
for life makes teaching. 

Eleanor. 

To work for life freed means will and purpose 
helping life, worthy man's life kept willing for firm 
purpose, all life's faculties worthily used, help 
willed as part of life's motive. Make this thought 
your daily help. 

Wilberforce. 

Think for life freed hoping, working, thinking 
much, with purpose firm to keep man's life worthy. 
So this life is won. 

Till will free makes man worthy life remains on 
earth; when will free keeps man worthy life fin- 
ishes with earth, and life freed begins. 

Eleanor a. 

A man's thinking helps him to will, if he works 
for fine thought. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Not wrong to read for pleasure, but wrong to 
read little things. Keep learning why life wills for 
itself its worth. 



ioo A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

Read books which help mind; thus help life to 
think well. Here life finds wider thought than 
man finds, yet life thinks here with the mind that it 
used while it was man. Read books which make 
you think, and work for thought worth thinking. 
Find work for mind pleasant work. Prepare your 
mind for wider life's thought. 

Eleanor a. 

To think well means work of mind. To think 
for life well keep mind working, lest it retrograde. 
Think what the life must be to win its freedom, its 
wide life, its full life, its high life. Think what 
mans worth lacks. Think high thoughts; for high 
worth think. Man thinks well, then life profits; 
man thinks little thoughts, life is thereby harmed. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Could free life win forced worth? No. 

Luther. 

We help you think, you do your thinking. Work 
for life, thinking well. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Worth living mans life is; but life wins yet higher 
life than that of earth. Will personal wins that 
higher life, will of life itself. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Man wills for life. Life's will is first the will 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 101 

of man who lives the life of earth. But life is what? 
None may comprehend except He who wills life into 
being. What from this follows? Will of life, 
being, while life wills on earth, that of man, wins 
life's worth for earth. Then life, to win higher 
life, must win first mans worth. But man wills, 
free to will as he wishes. Then free life, man per- 
sonal, wills that life itself become worthy higher 
life. Why then has life free will? Think, man 
who is life. 

You have this earth life for opportunity. Then 
this life, being you, this man, wins worth for higher 
life by your own free will. The Will who made 
life personal purposes that life personal win its own 
worth. This word, being fact known to us, helps 
you who, being only man, cannot know it. 

This happy, full, wide, free world of life immor- 
tal, waits you, when by your own free purpose you 
win it. 

Miltiades. 

I who talk was man many times. What my life 
was I remember. The life who won freedom speaks 
to help you, yet a man. Think what your help is, 
help from life freed. Then with firm purpose work 
your mans life through, willing from that work 
your help for others, willing to find God's aid, 
keeping firm the purpose which makes life free from 



ioa A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

weaknesSj willing for this life while keeping firm 
in that mans life. Thus work for life freed. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Happy work, firm work, purposeful work make 
your work always, looking forward to life freed. 

Eleanor a. 

Will of finite life wins finite worth. But life 
finite, free in will, wins that finite worth by its 
own will. Thus He who made life wills that finite 
life approach the Life who made it. Free life, with 
immortal powers, life willed worth, finally wins it 
through the powers which He who made it gives. 
He who gives to life finite its free will makes life 
win by free will that worth which He purposes that 
it find. Man, the willed life, finds his worth by his 
free will; thus life is purposed to find its worth. 
God made life finite, He wills for finite life, His 
will that which He made fulfills. But will which 
wins for life its finite worth, He who made life 
gives to life. Through that will finite life attains 
the worth which He who made it purposes. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Must wills for life, if "I will 3 ' fails to work. To 
loiter is to wait for freed life. 

Miltiades. 

Make part of work high thinking; keep thought 
fine; keep will firm; keep firm your purpose for 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 103 

worth of life; when thus man wills his thought 
helps more than himself. Think what man wins 
by work. That work is part of life's work. Keep 
from thinking lifeless thought. Find meaning 
where life finds help, in work, in will, in purpose. 
Keep thought broad. Firm purpose held right to 
mans work helps work as it is purposed by Him 
who gives it to man to be his help. Find meaning 
in life, will, purpose, work, freed life; work to find 
meaning for you in them all. 

Miltiades. 

Think high thoughts; every one helps life. 

Wilberforce. 

Keep from thinking morbid thoughts, weak 9 little 
thoughts, betraying life into littleness. Work mind, 
work will, work purpose, work memory, work the 
will for life freed. Keep firm, for then life finds 
all its powers helped. 

Eleanora. 

What for you means life personal? What for 
you means life immortal? What for you means 
will firm for life worthy? Keep thinking, for thus 
life helps itself toward wise thought. 

Miltiades. 

Man has his work to think for, but life is more 
than this man. 

Miltiades. 



104 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

By your purpose you keep your life worthy. By 
your purpose you free from littleness your life. 

Miltiades. 
Well to live mans life is well to prepare for life 

Wilberforce. 

Man thinks for that which he wishes. Man works 

for that which he thinks well for him. Think, then, 

think. T . 

Luther. 

Be firm yourself; then God helps you to keep firm. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Pray for God's help honestly; then with firm 

purpose work yourself for this full, free, happy life. 

Luther. 

Worship God. Wish for His help. Thank Him 

for His help. Pray for His help to think wisely. 

Miltiades. — Sunday Morning. 

Seek worth of life. What helps in seeking? 

Prayer. He who knows you helps honest prayer. 

Wilberforce. 

Think why man purposes, why life in this man 

weakens perhaps; why life for whom firm purpose 

is willed by his Maker waits to firmly will for this 

life; why life works for itself that worth which 

permits freedom from earth; why this life, your life, 

remains a man. 

Eleanor a. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 105 

What is life worthy? Work firm, life pure, life 
thinking high thought, life worshiping its Maker. 
Life willing to keep firm keeps worth of life; will- 
ing to keep firm works well; willing to keep firm 
waits not for worth, procrastinates not when it 

knows what it ought to do. „-.., . „ 

Miltiades. 

Wish for firm purpose, for life works for that 

which it wishes. T 1 

Luther. 

Happy work make your work fot life freed. 
While you think for this happy world free from 
mans limitations, think for man also. If you think 
for life freed well you think for man well, for life 
while it works on earth is man. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Work life's work for man purposed, thinking for 
this life. Man works for this life thinking mans 
thought, working mans work, living mans life. 

Dr. Coulter. 

This life, man to-day, will live higher life when 
his mans life finishes if his mans life wins that 
which life is purposed to win as man. Then this 
man works for that which life was purposed from 
the willing of life to win, by Him who made life. 
Then this man was by his Maker purposed to win 
life freed? No, not this man, but this life who is 
to-day this man. But life who, as man, fails to be 



106 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

worthy, fulfills not His purpose who wills for life 
worth. But life is made free. When life free finds 
worth, life finds that which He who made it free 
purposes. Then this life, free to win worth this 
time as man, fails to win life freed if he wins not 
the worth which his Maker purposes for life on 
earth. But this man knows he will win worth if 
he thus firmly purposes. Then this life fulfills his 
Maker s purpose by this mans free will. Will of 
this life fulfills God's purpose if this man wishes. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Think why life wills of free will. Think what 
worth of life for this man would be; think ivhat you 
lack; think with purpose to find help from your 
thought. Wise that would make you, wise in the 
thought which helps worth. 

Man Will thinks that man worthy means life 
worthy. Right, for life while it wills on earth is 
man. What life works in Will? Personal life 
immortal. Then let Will, the man, work with firm 
purpose, keep his life worthy, think hard, will for 
life freed, and man Will does that which wins life 
freed. 

Help, Will? Thank Him who permits you this 
help. Thank Him by will firm, by purpose firm, 
by life worthy. 

Dr. Coulter. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 107 

When purpose weakens put force into it at once. 
To win this high, full, free, happy life make your 
purpose to-day, to-morrow, all the days of your life 
on earth. 

Dr. Coulter. 

This word keep in mind — Will for this life 
works for it. What work has this man for help? 
Business work of man that he wishes to finish well. 
Has that work helped purpose? Yes. Then for 
that work keep purpose firm. That life who makes 
itself *firm of purpose wins help for life to eternity. 
But that business work is but part of your work. 

This thought make yours also — this life works 
its work firm of purpose for that work and for life 
worthy; so man works who wishes purpose worth 
while. 

Then, O man, keep working for that firm purpose 
which life finds help to eternity. To keep firm 
means will and purpose firm for both life's work 
of man and for the worth of mans life. What is 
worth of mans life? Work for help is part of that 
worth. Happily make your business work produce 
means for help. Make that part of your motive 
through your mans life. 

Think well. While life works on earth, think; 
while life wins firm purpose by work, think. "For 
life freed work" means for this man work for firm 



108 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

life; "for life freed will" means work; "for life 
freed purpose" means work. Keep firm for work, 
for by work life wins help for all time to eternity. 
This word keep in thought for your help. 

Help men to understand what work for life 
means, we pray, O Father. 

Wilberforce. 

No man will work better than he has with weak 
purpose. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Think for what man works — for life personal 
freed from man. The physical holds the life to 
man. The firm will for life freed works to relieve 
the life personal from the physical. But while life 
wills on earth, the body it uses for working tool. 

Dr. Coulter. 

"For life freed think" means for you — think for 
the man, for his work think, for his worth of life 
think, for his work for life wider think, what that 
work would be think, what firm purpose means 
think. You think for life for whom God purposes 
wisdom; yet His purpose permits life to think for 
itself. 

Dr. Coulter. 

"Think for life freed" means think how to win 
life freed. The personal self of man is purposed 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 109 

by its Maker to win life freed, but it must be won 
by the man's work for it, and the man is free to 
work well or ill, as he chooses. "Think for life 
freed" means then, think how the man shall work 
so as to win his life's personal freedom this time; 
and the man lives in the earth environment and 
has to deal with earth conditions. It means then, 
not maudlin, but sensible thought; not careless, but 
calmly searching thought. 

Why think for life freed? Because wise living 
in the present includes wise*thought and purpose^for 
the future. Because life freed is a wider, fuller, 
and happier life of the immortal self who is now 
a man on earth, and that wider life can be won 
this time if the man thinks wisely, and acts as his 
wise thinking teaches. 

It would be useless to think for life freed without 
an abiding faith in the immortality of the self, for, 
without that faith, how could one's aspirations rise 
above earth and the earth ideal, "let us eat, drink 
and be merry, for to-morrow we die" ? How could 
one understand the real meaning of the earth life 
as a preparation for wider personal life? 

But it is the man who is to "think for life freed," 
and, until he dies the bodily death, his self, his 
ego, cannot get away from his man's life ; his man's 
life of work of one kind or another, his man's life 



no A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

with other men, his man's life of moral and social 
duties, of man's pleasures and man's pains, his life, 
in short, in the environment of earth as men know 
it. And he cannot get away from man's life at 
bodily death, unless he is ready for a higher life 
of self. 

What is it that makes a man's life of self ready 
for higher* life? Man's personal character; his per- 
sonal character goes with him into the life beyond 
earth. 

How does a man achieve personal character? By 
use of his personal powers, and his personal opportu- 
nities in the environment of earth. 

What besides character does the life of self take 
with it to a higher life? The personal powers 
which are suited to both life on earth and life 
after earth. 

What are those personal powers ? Not the physi- 
cal powers of his fleshly personality, for the physical 
body, though it is a working tool marvelously suited 
to the man's requirements while his life is held 
to earth, is suited to earth only, and would be a 
hindrance to a life not limited to earth; not the 
physical powers, then, but the powers which belong 
to the self who is more than a man, which belong 
to the life of spiritual selfhood. 

Free necessarily, because he is made a personal 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT m 

self, the man learns wise use of those immortal 
powers through the teaching of earth, which is God's 
teaching for the life who is destined to higher exist- 
ence; and he learns of his own free choice, he learns 
because he is made a being who reasons, and is thus 
able to learn from the consequences of his expe- 
rience. And when he has learned wise and right 
use of his life's powers his life has won help that 
is help while life is. 

Then "think for life freed" means think how, by 
the use of the man on earth, to make life's immortal 
powers ready for the wider use that comes with the 
wider life of immortality beyond earth ; think what 
the man lacks of worth as he understands worth; 
think what he lacks of wisdom and firmness in the 
use of his life's immortal powers; think how he shall 
act to gain that which his careful and sensible 
thought finds he lacks ; how he shall finish well his 
man's work and life, and thus prepare himself for 
wider work and higher life in the world beyond 
earth. "He who finishes man's life well is well 
prepared for wider life." 

In the word which comes to us from these per- 
sonalities who live the "life freed," some of whose 
thought I have quoted in this book, beside the 
philosophy which they tell us is for them and for 
men the true philosophy, and beside the practical 



nz A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

application of that philosophy to the man's life, 
there is to be found between the lines much that 
will help us to understand partly what the "life 
freed" is. 

It is the same personal self who lived on earth 
who lives the life beyond earth. That personal self 
keeps and uses the same powers, will, purpose, mind 
and memory, that he used as a man. 

Those powers of personal self that were adequate 
for the work and thought of man are adequate for 
the wider work and thought of the life beyond 
earth. 

The personal self who has won the first wider life 
and is freed from returning to earth, has learned 
to use his powers firmly. He has overcome the 
weakness of will and purpose which mar the life 
on earth, and keeps firm in his work and in his 
wise purpose while life is. 

Forgiven for his mistakes of will on earth, sure 
of his firmness ( for he has learned how to use God's 
help to will) the self may, and does, calmly re- 
member and review his lives as man, and finds the 
memory of his earth experience, his mistakes and 
his successes as man, a help. The self recognizes 
now that the life on earth was a needed struggle, 
a needed teaching in the childhood of life, through 
which he learned the firm use of will and purpose 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 113 

that he must have to undertake the responsibility 
which his wider work and life impose. 

In the wider life the self who has continued his 
personal existence beyond the life on earth is freed 
from the fleshly body which was his residence on 
earth, but continues his mutual relations with other 
selves who have won the like freedom. And, being 
a personal self, his individuality must be distin- 
guished by form, and he is .clothed with a body not 
of earth elements, but with recognizable form. 
What that body is is not told, probably because we 
would not comprehend it. But it is a better body 
than the man's body, and it must be, we may say, 
an etherealized body, since we are told that the 
freed selves visit many other worlds than earth, 
and since they may and do come to men on earth 
not restricted by distances, or walls, or any of the 
impediments which hamper men's movements. 

And the freed self, though freed from the neces- 
sity of returning to earth, and happy to be freed; 
though he is no longer restricted by the man's limita- 
tions ; though his life is far wider, and the universe 
is his home; is not so far removed from humanity 
that he has lost the human feelings, affection, inter- 
est, wish to help, hope. Love lives on purified; 
wish to help the loved ones on earth lives on, 
though it cannot always be satisfied; hope for the 



H4 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

loved ones lives on, hope that they too may win 
their freedom, and join those who have gone before 
in their far higher, and freer and happier life. The 
future state, says Oliver Lodge, "appears to be a 
state which leaves personality and character and in- 
telligence much where it was. No sudden jump into 
something supernal, but steady and continued prog- 
ress, many activities and interests beyond our present 
ken, but with a surviving terrestrial aspect, occa- 
sionally accessible, and showing interest in the 
doings of those on earth, together with great desire 
to help and to encourage all efforts for the welfare 
of the race." And this would be quite natural and 
to be expected in those who remember their earth 
lives, and who have learned the meaning to the 
after life of the earth experience. 

Work is the portion of life beyond earth, as it 
was the portion of life on earth. The life is still 
finite, still retains its personal powers, and those 
powers have no meaning unless they are used. 
The finite life must always win its progress and 
its worth by its own work; and in the wider life 
work of will, work of purpose, work of mind and 
memory keeps those wonderful powers of personal 
self active and growing in breadth and strength as 
the self grows in breadth and strength. And the 
freed self understands better than men do the mean- 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 115 

ing and the helpfulness of work; understands that 
the personal life is made for growth ; not for retro- 
gression except for the time, and not for stagnation 
and atrophy of its powers, but for growth ; and that 
growth of finite personal character is only to be 
attained by wise and firm work of all its free per- 
sonal powers. 

What the specific work of the freed self is is not 
told in detail; we would probably not understand. 
But we are told that a part of its work is for help ; 
help to men, when they can overcome the difficulties 
which lie in the way of giving that help, and help 
for the lives of men who come to that world and 
are bewildered by their new and strange environ- 
ment. And what a wonderful thought that is! 
When we go over to that other world which must 
be so vastly different from our earth world, we will 
be met by friends who will help us to understand 
our new surroundings and our new life. 

And the other life thus teaches us that death of 
body on earth does not harm the life itself; it is 
but the changing of a garment ; it is but an incident 
in the life that is immortal. And so we must not 
think of those who have finished the earth life as 
dead; they are but gone from our sight. And if 
they have lived their earth lives well, they are freed ; 
if they have lived their earth lives not well, God is 



n6 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

just and merciful; He will teach them to win their 
freedom; they are not condemned forever because 
they need further teaching, and He will teach them 
surely. The thought is full of comfort. We cannot 
help but grieve when our loved ones are taken from 
us, we have lost so much and our hearts must be 
sore. They are in God's care, and our God is just 
and loving and merciful. And, if we grieve too 
sorely, their loving hearts are hurt by our unhap- 
piness. 

Thank God for the assurance that the earth grave 
is no victory for Death; thank God for the assur- 
ance of our continued life; thank God for the 
assurance of our immortal selfhood; thank God 
for the assurance that He made us able and will 
teach us how to triumph over weakness, and rise 
from strength to strength through immortality. 

The freed life knows Christ by personal knowl- 
edge. When Christ was a man, men knew him 
as one man knows another. The selves who have 
won the wider world know Him as one life there 
knows another. Men believe that He is God; the 
freed lives know that He was and is God. Men 
believe that He came to this earth to help them; 
the freed lives know that He comes to all earths 
which have man's life, to help other men as he 
helps men on our earth. And in the world of 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 117 

life that is freed from earths He is the Helper 
of finite life while that life is. 

And the freed lives are freed from the doubts 
that assail men. Their faith in God is sure; their 
faith in Christ is sure; their faith in the wisdom 
and love of God's purpose for the lives whom He 
made personal selves is sure ; their faith in personal 
immortality is sure; and their faith that the per- 
sonal self will, through God's teaching and God's 
help, triumph over weakness, and by its own "I 
will" grow in breadth, and fullness, and wisdom, 
and worthiness through all the life of immortality 
is sure. 

And that faith they would teach men, that men 
may understand better the meaning of the earth 
life, and work, and personal struggle ; that men may 
understand their personal freedom; that men may 
understand better the problems which their environ- 
ment brings — the problem of work, the problem of 
social life, the problem of good and evil, the problem 
of free will which yet fulfills finally and surely the 
purpose of life's Maker; the problem of the relation 
of the finite, made life, to and with God, its infinite 
Creator. 

And so that which is told us of the life beyond 
earth is not a puzzle, but an enlightenment. It tells 



n8 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

us that which we can understand, and that which 
helps us. It brings the two worlds into closer 
touch. It tells us that the life beyond earth is in 
very truth a broader life of the immortal personal 
self. 

This life who now lives the world life of man 
has powers with which life freed works; but this 
man waits to use them well, then this life waits 
for life freed. 

Miltiades. 

You live mans life, work mans work, belong 
to the men who live earth life; yet with help from 
this wider life you work. Think what help you 
may have from the teaching we give you. 

"Think for this life" means what to you? Will 
to be what you know is worthy; will to pray for 
His help who made you free life; will to live the 
mans life, believing in God; will to be firm for 
all that you think is well for this man, really well 
I mean; will to finish work begun; will to keep 
firm. Thus know what thinking for this life means. 
Then be that which your thought tells you is 
worthy. 

Help this man to think well, I pray, Father of 
Life. Help him to keep firm; help him to work for 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 119 

life freed, believing in Thee, Father of Life, full 

of faith in Thy mercy; feeling will for this life 

firm now and always. Help him; Thy will he 

would do; help him, O Father. __., . , 

Miltiades. 

They speak of God as the Father of Life. May 
we not think, with reverence, that Infinite God 
does not wish to live in lonely Omnipotence, doing 
nothing? May we not think, with reverence, that 
God, in life infinite and therefore without a peer 
as companion, in power omnipotent, in knowledge 
omniscient and therefore knowing all truth, found 
pleasure in creating a material universe worthy of 
His omnipotence, and in peopling it with finite lives 
in whose being He implanted an ineradicable desire 
to search for truth, whom He made able to find the 
highest knowledge of truth which finiteness may 
attain, and whose way to that truth He willed to be 
through their own use of the powers which He gave 
them ; through their own use of mind, will, purpose 
and memory, powers which, though finite, are like 
in kind to His own Infinite powers, and which, 
though finite, He willed to be the immortal powers 
of immortal selfhood? 

We must believe that He made every one of 
those lives for growth finally, and may we not be- 
lieve that He, omnipresent, finds interest in watch- 



120 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

ing the development of every one of those lives 
whom He made finite, free, personal selves; interest 
in teaching each one of those lives wisdom and 
truth, and pleasure when one of those lives fulfills 
by His way, which is by its own use of its own free 
powers, His wise and just and loving purpose for 
it? "Like as a father" He is to us, and, as His 
children, we are as to a father His companions. 
And as children we, by our actions which He made 
us free to choose ourselves, choose to give His love 
pain or pleasure. 

Keep that worth by which your mans life is made 
worthy; work to be all that you, this man, under- 
stand is worthy; keep from little things; work as 
this man believes he ought to work, full of firm 

purpose, 

Wilberforce. 

To keep firm is mans part in freeing his life. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Put from you the thought that mans life is part 
of Divine life. Mans life is made life, placed with 
other lives for teaching where man lives on worlds. 
For teaching placed there 9 remember. 

Put from you the thought of the whole of life as 
God; it is not right. He who willed, as His thought 
manifested, the universe, is mans God. He wills 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 121 

for the whole which He made the universe. You 

have this from life freed. ~ ~ T 

Dr. Coulter. 

Help to live the world life of man we make our 

word partly. Help to think for life high we make 

our word partly. rj 

Eleanor a. 

Think for work for help, for that wins help from 
Him who wills for your life; His work that is. 
Will for help helps life; then with firm purpose 
make work for help part of your mans work. 

Luther. 

For what fine thought worked you this week? 
To work for fine thought helps life. Keep work 
that helps life being firmly finished; not begun and 
left unfinished, but finished; that keeps firm the 
purpose. 

Miltiades. 

Firm of purpose be while finishing your life this 
time on earth; then happy freed life waits you. This 
hope I may give you; but you find the will for this 
life. Unless work brings firm purpose life works 
still on mans world. 

We give you many thoughts that we hope will 
help you to think. 

Wilberforce. 

We worship Thee, Father of All, we worship 
Thee, full of reverence, thanking Thee for life, for 



122 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

health, for life that wills for itself worth by Thy 
purpose. Help us to do Thy will, O Father. Help 
us to be worthy. 

Eleanora. — Sunday Morning. 

Will for this life works for it, remember. What 
has will been of help this day? Put force in pur- 
pose to work mans work. Keep firm, for that helps 
life itself. Will for life freed wins help from Him 
who made life free. To will for mans worth is 
to will for life freed. 

Yet life with purpose to win freedom from man 
may lose its purpose. Then He who made life for 
worth penalizes life, penalizes by further work of 
earth, further life as man. Will for this life, firm 
to the finish of a mans life, wins His help who pur- 
poses for life worth by itself won. 

From worth to yet higher worth life purposed 
worth rises when first high life has been won. 
Think, O man, think. To find, then hold fast 
firm purpose, is work for life freed. Think be- 
cause your thinking finds your weak places. Keep 
firm; thus life wins for itself wider, fuller, worthier, 
happier life freed from mans weakness, full with 
firm purpose, working for the wider and wider 
worth purposed for finite life by its Maker. 

Find for yourself your weak places; correct them, 
and thus work for life freed. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 123 

Have I helped you? Thank God with me. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Your life is that of man. While you live this 
mans life your life may win worth for high, full, 
freed life. Your will makes you worthy; your pur- 
pose keeps you worthy. 

Well for you this life talks. Profit by the word 
from life freed, for then, firm to your life of man 
this time finished, working for this full, free, happy, 
worthy life, you find your purpose the help which 
God wills that it be finally. Then you, by your 
purpose kept firm, free your life from the life of 
earth. 

Keep firm is the helping word. Work for life 
freed; think what you, the life, lack; find that. 

Luther. 

Man Will, this life helps you. To think for 
life freed we help you. Thank Him who permits 
you this help. This life helps you to understand 
mans life. 

Luther. 

Not when man wills, when God wills, will the 
life finish its world life. Yet by the mans purpose 
he makes his life worthy freed life. Keep firm, 
then, while you finish this mans life; then happy, 
freed, firm for all work, for all life, thank Him who 
wills you freedom. 



124 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

To keep firm is man's work; to free life belongs 
to life's Maker. 

Wilberforce. 

Think, for that helps mind, life's power; work, 
for that helps purpose, life's power. 

Miltiades. 

Would thinking for life freed hinder the thought 
which man finds helpful? Think with purpose to 
know your lack. Make firm purpose the help it is 
willed to become. This time find will firm that 
helps both work and worth of life your constant 
help. 

Luther. 

To think for this life make your habit; but think 
for your man's work, too. 

Eleanor a. 

Will of this man keeps this life worthy. To un- 
derstand the thought which we give you, think hard. 
We tell you keep firm: For what keep firm? 
Think. Work for life freed. Why that word? 
Think. Keep firm; why that? To understand our 
"keep firm" think what you would keep firm for, 
what your life needs, what he who wishes his life 
freed must be and do. Have men found helt> in 
firm purpose? Why? Think. Have men won 
help by help willed? Think why. To keep that 
life who is man to-day worthy is what? Think of 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 125 

that. Will for life freed works for it; you heard 

that many times; think from that to your work for 

life freed, what your work for that would be. Think 

well, for thus finding weak places, you know what 

you need to heal them. Will for this life while 

this man works. For your mans work keep firm, 

for your life worthy keep firm, for your will for 

help keep firm. 

Have I helped you think? _, 

Eleanor a. 

Keep full of faith that He who wills for men 
His help is help sufficient, if men themselves live 
well. If men themselves follow Christ, His life, 
His life of noble sacrifice suffices for them. Live 
with Christ your help; live well then. 

Dr. Coulter. 

This life wishes to help you, the man. Whether 
we help you decide yourself. 

Dr. Coulter. 

When this man was thinking for business, firm 

to do it well, he found the help which will be help 

while he finishes his mans work. Yet business is 

but part of life's work on earth. Keep that firm 

purpose which life finds while it is man. But will 

for that for which life works while it is man helps 

but for earth perhaps; then will works but partly 

well. _-.. . , 

Miltiades. 



126 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

Will for this life by working those powers which 
belong to the personal life immortal. This mans 
own powers make this life worthy. 

Luther. 

Think for this life, but think for mans work also, 
for that you have to finish while your life is man. 

Miltiades. 

When work begun is left partly finished, man 
weakens in purpose. 

Eleanora. 

Will Higher made free will life's power. His 
purpose for life, since His will is Will Supreme, 
must by the will He makes life power be fulfilled. 
Think from that to your own will for life freed. 

Eleanora. 
Man lives few world years. His life is wider 
than his mans life tells. When he receives permis- 
sion from his Father to begin the freed life, his life 
widens beyond his dreams. Keep thinking for this 
life, keep working for this life, keep firm in mans 
life, for thus life wins its wider world of being. 
Take that home to your brain. You, the life, win 
this life if you, the man, work for it firm of purpose 
while you work as this man. Put force in purpose 
to win life freed; thus you win His help who is 
Father of Life. Keep firm to this mans life fin- 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 127 

ished; then thank your Maker for His goodness 
while life is. 

Wilberforce. 

With work think; with thought work. 

Luther. 

Work as a man would who wishes to win for his 
life the worth for freedom from work and life on 
earth. Think well, for that which you think makes 
you worthy or unworthy. His work who wishes 
his life freed will be work for the worth which life 
as man wins, and for that work he uses life's im- 
mortal powers. 

Miltiades. 
When you fail, as men do fail in the work which 
keeps them busy, then put force in purpose for that 
very work. You fail sometimes when you wish to 
succeed. But by firm purpose to succeed you do 
succeed. 

Dr. Coulter. 
Work for life freed. To begin that work, then 
to forget to keep on working, harms life. 

Wilberforce. 
Keep mind working. As mind works life keeps 
understanding wider thought. 

Help this man to think wisely, I pray, O Father. 



128 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

Help him to understand the help Thou hast per- 
mitted him while he wills as man. 

Dr. Coulter. 

God helps firm life. We know He helps weak 
life, too. Weak life prays honestly for His help, 
He will grant it. He teaches life. Work teaches, 
mistakes teach, will free unworthily used teaches; 
man was thus made. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Keep firm, then life will find God's help who 
wills for life free will. That we told you, yet this 
we told you also — when weak ask His help. That 
tells this — man with life free wills for his worth; 
his life finds the worth which he wishes; man, the 
world-dweller, has from his Maker free will, but 
free will mistakes perhaps; then work teaches, pen- 
alty teaches. Many lives will be taught by penalty. 
Work teaches, mistakes teach wise use of free will. 
God will help life with the very help it needs. 

Luther. 

THE PERSONAL WILL, AND GOd's HELP 

The doctrine says, "Life wins its worth itself, yet 
wins it helped by God." That seems perfectly 
clear; but there is a puzzle there, too. And again 
— "The life must keep firm itself to win God's 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 129 

help." How may that be? If the life keeps firm 
itself, it wins the worth for freedom. But if it 
keeps firm itself, how is it that God helps? If 
the man keeps firm himself, God helps him to keep 
firm. But he must keep firm himself, of his own 
will to keep firm, or God does not help him. Yet 
if he can keep firm himself, why does he need God's 
help? There is the puzzle. 

The answer must be this — he does not keep firm 
himself without God's help. His will is a finite 
will, the will of a being not perfect. He is then 
subject to the weaknesses, the weak moments of an 
imperfect being. If his will were perfect it would 
be as God's will, and he would never have to strug- 
gle to keep it firm. He is a finite life, made for the 
struggle through which the finite life wins its worth. 
He cannot be perfect, for then he would be as his 
Maker, and there are times in the struggle when 
his will is not at its best. His consciousness of an 
ought, in other words his conscience, which is made 
by God an inherent part of him, is part of God's 
help. But conscience will not always keep him 
firm ; then he needs help outside of himself. In his 
weak times he prays for help to his Maker. If his 
prayer be honest, really wishing God's help, and 
with faith that his honest wish will bring him help, 
he finds his will helped somehow. Just how God 



130 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

helps we who are only finite may not fully know. 
The very act of honest prayer with faith is itself 
help. Yet there must be some spiritual help, which 
God alone knows how to give, that enables him to 
lift his head after prayer and again say firmly, "I 
will." It is still his own "I will," but it has been 
helped to be a firm "I will" by God's loving will 
to help him. 

And so, in the struggle for which it is made, 
helped by the conscience which is itself proof that 
life is made for worth finally, helped by prayer 
with wish and faith, helped to renewed firmness by 
the loving will to help of its Maker, the life, though 
finite, triumphs finally by its own "I will." 

He who wishes His help who made his purpose 
free, finds that help. Yes. Taught by penalty the 
reasoning life finds helpful thought. 

Luther. 

This man works for his business. That is part 
of life's earth work. For life that is a help when 
that work brings to man firm purpose. Yet life 
works on earth for more than business. 

Luther. 

Man thinks for work of business. Right, for his 
life profits if his work is firm. To work life's work 
for earth willed, firm of purpose, is to work part 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 131 

of life's work well. But for life freed work also. 
To win this full, high, freed, happy life needs firm 
purpose. 

Luther. 

"I will" keeps life firm; "I will" keeps life wor- 
thy; "I will" wins His help who made life personal 
self. "I will" takes life to heaven; remember that. 

Eleanora. 

"I will" finds ways to work. Keep working well, 
for thus life wins purpose. Full with purpose use 
the remaining years of your mans life. For work 
that helps life find time. To this mans life finished 
work for high life. Freed life, wide life, full life, 
high life waits you if you firmly use mans life this 
time. Think what you lose by weak purpose. Keep 
firm. 

Thank Him who purposes work as help for life. 
Thank Him, while working full with firm purpose. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Think how to work; think what work for life 
freed is. Man works the earth work for life willed, 
thinking what help that work may be to life itself ; 
then man finds reasons for his work. He lives few 
years as man, but life lives to immortality. What 
help life finds by mans work man determines him- 
self. 

Dr. Coulter. 



133 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

Man wills for life wider of free purpose. His 
life widens as his purpose forwards him toward 
worth for this high life. Mans purpose, mans 
free purpose ■, widens as his will works for life freed. 

Dr. Coulter. 

"I will" keeps life working. ff I will" keeps life 
firm. Win firm purpose for work, for then you win 
firm purpose that helps your work for this life. 

Eleanor a. 

Man is life personal, whose will is his personal, 
free power. If he wills for life freed, his will ac- 
cords with God's purpose for his life. When this 
life will be freed depends on this mans free will, 
for He who made life free wills for life worth won 

by itself. rT 

Eleanora. 

Man thinks for that which he wishes, man works 

for that which he thinks well for him. Think, 

then, think. 

Luther. 

That man who wishes to be firm is firm. Real 

will is firm. 

Eleanor a. 

While you live mans life work all work firm of 

purpose. What better word could I give you? 

Weak life wins mans life once more; firm life 

wins freedom. 

Miltiades. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 133 

Man lives his world life working by his free pur- 
pose. When he works well his life wins firm free 
purpose. He works for his personal welfare partly. 
His life, being personal, wills by his own free will. 
Then by his own free will he wins that worth which 
God , Creator of worlds and life, purposes for him. 
Then man has will, work, purpose firm, work for 
his world welfare, work for his wider life, all by 
His purpose who made him life personal. And by 
His purpose life must win, by mans work and 
worth, the purposed wider life. 

Think from that for your help; think hard; work 
for wider life by working for mans life worthy; 
keep firm. 

You think; I talk to help you think. 

Dr. Coulter. 

This life works. You need that work, for you 
must work in this life, and by your work of this 
man you prepare for your life's wider work. 

This life works, keep in mind. Keep work being 
firmly done; thus prepare for your life's higher 
work. 

Miltiades. 

Make your purpose, your main purpose, the work 
by which you, the life, win freedom from man and 
worlds. 

Miltiades. 



i 3 4 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

Find happy hope your help; but work for that 
for which you hope. 

Dr. Coulter. 

You wish God's help. Pray for it honestly, not 
dishonestly, for that puts from you His help. 

Eleanor a. 

He who keeps firm himself merits God's help. 
God will help you while you feel the need. Pray 
for God's help, meaning to be helped. 

Miltiades. 

We repeat the word many ways, wishing to im- 
press on you that your free purpose must win for 
your life its high, full, wide, worthy, happy life 
beyond man and earth. 

Keep firm, for then life freed helps you really. 

Wilberforce. 

This life works. Man, by his work, prepares for 

wider life's work. Work your mans work, learning 

how to work firm of purpose. This life thinks. 

Man learns that high thought helps him. Will to 

be working man, working life then, for thus life 

learns for its higher life. T , 

' y ' Luther. 

We tell you keep firm, thus you win God's help. 

Yet He helps weak life, you think. Yes, He teaches 

weak life. His help then for weak life is teaching, 

penalty perhaps. wr, 

Wilberforce. 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 135 

Will, this will help you think. What has this 
work been for? What its motive? Would I who 
love this work make you part of it, not intending 
by you to help men to understand the thought? 
Tell the word from freed life; tell for help what 
helps you. 

Dr. Coulter. 

We think for this work to help men. To tell 
this word from life freed brings help to men who 
will think. Tell your faith; to tell faith helps faith; 
what you tell is our thought, but to tell that thought 
with faith helps faith in other people. Tell your 
faith, faith in God, faith that He wills for men, 
faith that men will for this life when with firm 
purpose kept firm they live mans life; faith that 
happy life won by work comes to life of all men; 
faith that God wills for all life purpose firm won 
on earth. 

Dr. Coulter. 

Is this Will, who wishes for life freed? His life 
wakes to realization of his future if he really lives 
his mans life rightly. His will, but finite, has the 
Higher Will of life's Maker to fulfill. His will 
works as he wishes, for he was willed by his Maker 
free will. His will works with his future in view 
if he thus wishes. His mans life is but the world 
life, yet his life, being a personal, immortal self, 



136 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

wins the wider future purposed for him by his 
Maker by his free purpose. 

Think, Will; thus I put before you the worth 
of life. 

This thought will be help to this man — By free 
will, mans will, you live well or not well this mans 
life. Keep firm. Will, keep firm, you work for life 
wider. For your help we make this work your 
work. For your help we talk. For you we think, 
hoping to help you win life freed. You can, if you 
thus will. Free to work for this life well or weakly, 
you may, this time of life where other men live 
their world life, you may work for the wider world 
of freed life. 

Keep work for life freed firm; live well; then 
thank Him who judges whether life be worthy the 
wider, fuller, happier world of freed life. 

Think, Will. Life freed wishes to help you. 
Win, then hold fast firm purpose. Thus we help 
you to win this full, high, free, working, worthy, 
firm personal life beyond the world of man. Keep 
your purpose working. Hard to win this life? 
Will, for you I talk; it would be not only hard, but 
impossible for life who purposes to keep itself weak. 
Remember that. 

Remember this too — work means just work. To 
be firm means just that. Keep life Will firm, by 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 137 

keeping man Will firm. Firm to this life of man 
finished be. You must be firm; you must, to win 
this high, full, free, happy life. 

To help you to think I make this my talk. Keep 
man Will firm, for them life Will wins his personal 
wider life. 

Help Will to keep firm, with him I pray, Father 
of Life. 

Good night, Will. 

Dr. Coulter. 
With hearts full of thanks to God we work for 
men. Help us so to work that men may be helped, 
we pray Thee, Father of Life. 

Dr. Coulter. 

The word which I have quoted is a practical 
application, to the formation of the man's character, 
of the philosophy which these thinkers in the wider 
life tell us they know is the true philosophy. It is 
not abstruse, it is not technical, but a plain straight- 
forward word which brings to us an understanding 
of the true relation which the life of man holds 
to the whole life of self, which is a personal life 
immortal; and an understanding of the true rela- 
tion of the finite life to its Infinite Maker. 

Man lives on earth, and the work of earth must 
be done. Man's life is a life that continues beyond 



138 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

earth, and the earth work is part of the work of 
the continuing life. Man is a social being, and 
cannot live by himself, or for himself alone. But 
the foundation of his social life is personal char- 
acter. The progress of human society is condi- 
tioned by the gain in personal worth of character 
of its members. The social being, man, who must 
live on earth in mutual relations with his fellows, 
is also a distinct personality whose self is destined 
to personal life beyond earth. Therefore, with his 
work for his physical needs and his future on 
earth, and his work made necessary by his social 
life, must go work for the personal character which 
will fit him to enter into the life beyond earth. 
He cannot work and think for any one of the three 
to the exclusion of the others. While he lives on 
earth he must adapt himself to the earth environ- 
ment, and at the same time prepare himself for his 
destined wider life. He is endowed with powers 
which are the free powers of his enduring life, 
and by wise use of those powers while his life is a 
man on earth he prepares for a wise use of the 
same powers in a life wider than he may know on 
earth. He himself chooses to use them wisely, for 
his Creator made him free. In the wider life he 
must be firm in the wise use of his free powers to 
fulfill his Creator's further purpose for him. There- 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 139 

fore his life remains a man on earth, reincarnated 
perhaps many times in man's flesh, until, through 
his experience in the personal and social environ- 
ment of earth, he learns to choose wisdom and firm- 
ness. Then, ready for freedom from earth, with 
wisdom and firmness won, wisdom and firmness 
which will be help to all his life of immortality, he 
the personal self enters into his wider life, and by 
his free use of his personal powers rises from worth 
to worth, and attains all that his Maker purposes 
for him. God is the Father of Life, and God is 
Love. He teaches every child of His with the 
teaching that he needs. If the life chooses to be 
firm, He helps it to keep firm ; if the life be weak of 
purpose yet honestly wishes His help, He helps it to 
win firm purpose; if the life uses firm purpose un- 
worthily or wickedly, harming himself and his fel- 
low men, God teaches through penalty; and when 
the life has learned that which He purposes that it 
shall learn on earth, He grants it His just forgive- 
ness for past weakness, and lifts it to the heaven of 
freed life, high life, full life, wide life, worthy life, 
happy life, firm in its own free purpose to fulfill 
God's purpose forever. 

This is the faith which our friends in the wider 
life would have us make our working faith. And 
in the forceful words which I have quoted they 



140 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

have sought to show a man how rightly to live the 
life which he must while he is on earth, and thus 
earn, through his own work for it, the high life 
which they themselves have won. 

This is the faith which our friends would teach 
men as help to personal worth on earth, the faith 
that brings to men high ideals of personal character, 
the faith that will help men to develop them- 
selves, not to a dead level of mediocrity of 
character, ability and achievement, for such a devel- 
opment would be contrary to the very meaning of 
personality, but to the high attainment which each 
man may win for himself through his own wise use 
of his own personal powers and his own personal 
opportunities. Men are personalities, not dolls, all 
thrown out from the same mould. "Individuality 
is the fact and the law of each man's selfhood within 
society"; and it is through the high individuality, 
the high personal character of its members, upheld 
by high ideals and high personal purpose, and pro- 
gressively developed by each personality according 
to his own best ability, that society will grow better, 
honesty and truth, justice and love will hold their 
sovereignty in the minds and purposes of mankind, 
and God's kingdom come on earth. 

I find in the word from the life beyond earth 
thought which I do not find elsewhere in all my 



THE QUOTED PASSAGES AND MY COMMENT 141 

reading. It is big thought that broadens the man's 
conception of the greatness of finite personal self- 
hood, of the greatness of the immortal life's im- 
mortal powers, of the responsibility that the Wilier 
of Life imposes upon personal self, that it fulfill 
His wise and loving purpose by personal use of the 
free powers which He gives to life. I find thought 
which clears a little our dim vision of what the 
life beyond earth is; thought which we can under- 
stand, and which makes us wish that we too may 
live that life of broader work in a far, far broader 
field of wider vision, fuller understanding, and 
higher aspirations than the limitations of flesh and 
earth permit. 

It is not my thought. I could not have found it 
without the word told me from the freed life. I 
have been a business man for more than fifty years, 
and nothing in my life before this work for help to 
men's thought was brought to me could have led 
to such thought. I read a good deal, yes, but this 
thought has not been found in my reading. It has 
been told me word by word while I held my mind 
open to telepatic hearing, and closed to my own 
thinking. I have thought from the word told me, 
yes. And I have worded my thought in my own 
way to clear it to my own mind, but the foundation 
thought is not my own, / know. 



142 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

The word is never trivial, and always reverent. 
It is such a word as we might expect from those 
who understand the earth life of selfhood as a brief 
part of the whole life of self, who have learned the 
wisdom and strength that won for them their free- 
dom, and who, thanking God for their earth teach- 
ing, wish to help men to understand, and to live 
wisely. 

And here I leave the word with you, the reader. 
It is not my word. Do you think that any man 
could have written these passages as his own thought 
without knowing the thought which he was going 
to put into words, and without thinking about what 
words he should use? Yet in just that way they 
were written. The writer was simply the scribe, 
writing from dictation, and knowing what was to 
come no further than the word which was to follow 
the one he was writing. 

Believing with firm faith that the word is just 
what it claims to be, I leave it with you, the reader. 
The thought which was given to help me for my 
problem of man's life will help you, if you wish 
to be helped. 



ipttrpoge 
M #aj>er bp WiilUam C. Comatocfc 



purpose 

/M PERSONAL purpose is an intention to be 
/£%> carried out, a structure to be erected accord- 
ing to a plan, an ideal to be realized. The working 
power by which a. personal purpose is carried out 
is the personal will, and the daily work for the pur- 
pose goes well, or ill, according to the efficiency 
or weakness of the will. The efficiency of the daily 
will depends a good deal upon the definiteness of 
the intention, the clearness of the plan, the quality 
of the ideal. 

The life of a man without purpose would be 
merely negative, and useless to himself or to others. 
No normal man is without a purpose of some kind ; 
and it is self-evident that without purpose in the 
world there would be no development or progress. 

Purposes are as varied as are personalities. The 
purpose of a man may be good or evil; weak and 
indifferent, or strong and forceful; may submit to 
circumstances, or utilize them ; for the personal man 
is free to choose what and how strong his purpose 
shall be. The character of a man is revealed by the 
worth of his purpose; and, conversely, the strength 

145 



i 4 6 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

or weakness of his purpose develops favorably or 
unfavorably his personal character. 

And over-ruling all is the Supreme Purpose of 
the Wilier of the Universe, who, omnipotent, im- 
manent and eternal, governs that universe while He 
permits it to be. 

By His purpose man is made a personal self, 
gifted with a purpose that is his own, and free 
so far as is consistent with the Supreme Purpose. 
By His purpose man lives on worlds suited to his 
life, and lives a personal finite life in mutual rela- 
tions with his fellow-men. By the Supreme Pur- 
pose man is made an immortal personal self, whose 
powers, will, purpose, mind and memory, are the 
immortal powers of his immortal life. By the 
Supreme Purpose that immortal personal self is 
made able to learn, through his experience on worlds 
in his mutual relations with his fellows, the wisdom 
that fits him for a wider life than that of worlds. 
By the Supreme Purpose man's worth that fits his 
life for the wider life that follows life on worlds is 
his own free achievement. 

Man, then, is responsible for his purpose. He is 
responsible to himself, for he knows that his per- 
sonal powers make him able to grow, and he knows 
that his purpose directs his work and his thought 
through which he grows. His free will to do, and 



PURPOSE 147 



think, and become what he chooses makes him re- 
sponsible to himself for the worth or worthlessness 
of his personal purpose. 

He is responsible to Society. The laws of Society, 
which may be divided into community laws, national 
laws, economic laws, and moral laws, are such as 
the concurrent thought of mankind has found most 
conducive to peace, justice, and uprightness; and 
Society demands obedience to those laws by the 
individual under penalty. 

He is responsible to the Wilier of his life, who 
made him a finite, free, personal self, able to grow, 
able to learn wisdom through experience, and who 
purposes for him an immortal growth in wisdom and 
worth to be brought about always by his own free 
personal powers. 

He cannot escape from this three-fold responsi- 
bility, though he may not be acutely conscious of it. 
He may, through lack of knowledge of himself, 
violate the laws of his willed nature; that brings 
its penalty, and through penalty he learns wisdom, 
because he is made a reasoning being. He may 
rebel against Society; that brings its penalty. He 
may think he can ignore his God; that brings its 
penalty. He may think, and do, and be anything he 
chooses to-day, but in the end he cannot escape from 
his three-fold responsibility. 



148 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

This may seem too broad a statement, but the 
history of man on earth, if intelligently read, con- 
firms it. 

We men find it rather easy to forget our respon- 
sibility. We think too little, and we do not think 
hard enough. We have a purpose, but we do not 
think whether it is far-reaching enough. With some 
of us it is to get through the day's work, considering 
it a burden, and then idle away the time in shallow 
pleasures. With some it is to best our fellow-men, 
honestly or dishonestly, but to best them. With 
some the purpose is sensual, or wicked, or criminal. 
With some it is wealth, or fame, or power, just for 
the sake of possessing them, though we know they 
must be left on earth. Short-sighted purposes these. 

But there are higher purposes, of course, for men 
are not all short-sighted. The purpose of the scien- 
tist, of the thinker, of the worker for help, all of 
which benefit mankind; the purpose of the seeker 
for wealth or power that he may use it to benefit 
mankind ; such purposes use well the powers of self, 
and both indicate and confirm the high character of 
the purposer. 

One cannot, of course, enumerate the purposes of 
men except in a general way, for they are personal 
and free, and vary with the education and environ- 
ment of the individual. But each of us, if he will, 



PURPOSE 149 



can think, and think hard, what his purpose should 
be to fulfill his three-fold responsibility, to himself, 
to mankind, and to his God. 

Well, we may say, that's not a bad idea. But 
thinking hard means work. It would be easier to 
go to the movies now, and think some other time 
when we feel more like thinking. And the longer 
we put it off the less we want to think hard, until, 
one day, after perhaps many years of getting along 
fairly well without any very serious thinking, we 
wake up, and find ourselves in a rut from which it 
is going to be hard to get out. We find ourselves 
not only no stronger, but actually weaker than we 
were years ago. In all those years we know that we 
have made no growth that is worth while, no prog- 
ress of any account. We find that in the qualities 
that go to make a man we have really deteriorated. 
The discovery is apt to be startling, and we have 
to be careful or we will go to pieces. 

But suppose we resolve to think now. We will 
begin with honestly trying to find what we lack ; and 
that is going to take a good deal of thinking, and 
a good deal of attentive observation. For instance, 
let us find what it is that gives to that man whom 
we thoroughly respect his strong personality. What 
has he which we lack? 

We will not have to think very far to find some 



ISO A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

of our lacks; we know them well enough. How 
are we going to cure them ? The answer is in two 
words, — I will. If it is a real I will it becomes in 
time an uplifting purpose. 

And, as we think, the purpose broadens, and be- 
comes more understanding. We begin to understand 
the value of selfhood. We begin to realize what 
wonderful helps the powers of selfhood with which 
God has endowed us may be, if they are rightly 
used. We note that the growth of man, and the 
progress of mankind has come through wise use of 
these personal powers. Thought begins to beget 
ideals which we would like to realize in ourselves, 
and with the wish comes the beginning of a real 
purpose. 

Purpose looks to the future, and utilizes to-day 
in the interest of the future. A purpose kept firm 
accomplishes its object because it works a man's "I 
will" every day. It is very easy to be fitful in one's 
purpose, firm to-day and uncertain or weak to- 
morrow. It is easy to allow little things to divert 
our purpose. It is easy to say, with Rip VanWinkle, 
"We won't count this time" ; and soon purpose goes 
to sleep. To keep a purpose firm means work that 
will not permit it to go to sleep. 

We are men, and live man's life. We have a 
right to work for earth success, so long as we do it 



PURPOSE 151 



with due regard for the rights of others. We 
thus fulfill a part of our responsibility to ourselves 
and to Society; for earth success rightly won, 
means strength and steadfastness and equity of per- 
sonal purpose; and he whose success in the line 
which he marks out for himself is fairly and honestly 
won, and who makes his success serve others, con- 
tributes to the progress of Society. 

But, when we think further, we find that we have 
no right to consider earth success the whole of our 
purpose. When we reflect that we are immortal 
lives, we find that the earth work is but part of the 
immortal life's work. When we reflect that we are 
immortal personal selves, we find that the personal 
powers which we use on earth must be our own 
immortal powers. Then we ask ourselves why we 
should be given such wide powers if they are only 
for earth use; why we should strengthen ourselves 
by work on earth if there is not work to be done in 
the life beyond earth. We leave the material re- 
sults of our work behind when we leave earth, and 
we may so will that those material results shall be 
help to others after we are gone. And our fine 
thought, if given to the world, helps others after we 
are gone. But we ourselves enter finally a wider 
life. Of what personal benefit to us would that be, 
unless we take with us something personal that as- 



152 A WORD FOR HELP FROM THE WIDER WORLD 

sures us that we are the same selves who worked as 
men, and that will help us in the wider life's work? 
What is it that we take with us? 

We take our personal powers, broadened and 
strengthened by our work as men. We take the fine 
high thought which helped us as men. We take the 
worth of personal character that we won by our 
man's work and purpose. And we have a right to 
believe that when we enter that wider life thus 
armed, the wider work of that life which is free 
from the limitations that circumscribe man will win 
for us wider and yet wider life, higher and yet 
higher worth of character, through the ages of im- 
mortality. 

And, as our thinking lifts us higher than merely 
earth considerations, we find our purpose, which is 
our own and free, a broader purpose than to win 
merely earth success; and we will to so utilize the 
life and work of man in the interest of our immortal 
future that we shall enter the wider life armed and 
ready for our work there. 

And if we keep ourselves firm, by our own free 
purpose we fulfill our responsibility to the Wilier 
of Life, who made us the crown of His creation, per- 
sonal selves; endowed us with reasoning mind; en- 
dowed us with will and purpose adequate to our 
needs forever; who purposes for us worth, and that 



PURPOSE 153 



our worth shall be forever our own achievement. 
May God help us to think well, to work well, 
and while we are men to purpose wisely for both 
our man's work and life, and at the same time for 
our immortal future. 



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